Phnom Penh - Cambodia is now officially home to the most dangerous roads in the 10-member Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), officials said Thursday. Cambodian drivers are infamous for their blithe disregard for traffic laws, let alone the laws of physics, and as roads improve rapidly this combination resulted in an average of 4.5 people dying on the country's roads every day, new statistics said - up from 3.7 in 2006.
Figures by the Ministry of Public Works and Transport for the first half of 2008 show 3,870 documented traffic accidents, resulting in 6,839 people injured and 956 killed - nearly 15 per cent higher than the same time last year, with 833 fatalities reported.
"We have to rush to educate people on the traffic laws," the ministry's secretary-general of transport, Ung Chun Hour, said by telephone. "And we have to enforce laws like helmets for motorbike riders and their passengers."
The ministry did not provide updated comparisons to other ASEAN countries, but said Cambodia's fatality rate puts it ahead of much larger nations such as the Philippines, also known for road chaos.
The government spent millions on driver education, taking out television and newspaper advertisements and setting up driver education centres, after the Asian Development Bank estimated accidents cost the country 3 per cent of its GDP in 2003 alone.
However, poorly paid traffic police often lack the will to enforce the law and a "fine" of 1.25 dollars (or 2.50 dollars if the driver insists on a receipt) usually makes the traffic violation go away.
Drunk driving is also rampant, but Cambodia has no more sophisticated ways of testing if a driver is over the limit than smelling his or her breath - usually after the accident.
