Jocotepec Mayor José Miguel Gómez this week launched “Te queremos con vida” (We want you alive), a new public awareness campaign aimed at reducing the frequency of traffic fatalities, particularly those involving motorcycles.
The mayor indicated that since he took office last October, deaths from highway accidents have averaged three per month. The latest incident occurred Saturday, July 13, when two young men from the municipality were killed when the motorcycle they were riding crashed head-on into a truck in the vicinity of El Chante.
“It’s not my place to say who was to blame for the accident. But I witnessed the bodies of the 15- and 18-year-old boys lying in the road, both without proper protection,” he observed. “What will it take to get people to abide by the rules?”
Motorbikes are a popular mode of transport among Jocotepec inhabitants. Recent crackdowns by state and municipal traffic police to enforce the use of helmets and other regulations have met with widespread public criticism, Gómez reported. Some citizens complain that the cops are being too tough, while others say they are too lax.
As the government pushes for compliance with the rules of the road through public service announcements on posters and banners, advertisements in social media and newspapers, recordings broadcast from street cars and in visits to local schools, the mayor is pleading with citizens to jump on the bandwagon. He is officially encouraging people to engage in “bullying” tactics to call out irresponsible motorbike riders who are spotted without helmets or traveling with children and pets sandwiched between drivers and passengers or otherwise displaying dangerous practices.
At the same time Gómez is advocating for better state services that will allow motorists to obtain driver permits, license tags and proper vehicle paperwork. Likewise, he is appealing to a private towing outfit to lower fees for transport and impoundment storage of vehicles that may be confiscated in highway traps.