Citizens and residents have called on competent authorities to determine specific areas for motorcycle driving; tighten control on their use; provide onsite first-aid; establish training centers for amateurs; and identify safety requirements for driving.
They interacted with the awareness initiative on risks of reckless motorcycle driving launched by Abu Dhabi Police. The initiative calls for compliance with the rules and regulations of traffic while driving, avoid overtaking between vehicles, to prevent the risk of being run over and hit. Captain Ahmed bin Hadi, the Falcon (Al Saqr) bike rider, warned against motorcycles' acrobatic stunts, adding that such stunts jeopardize the lives of riders, urging them to adhere to the GCC bikes standards and specifications.
For his part, biker Hilal Al Zaabi, Member of the Abu Dhabi Bikers Association, emphasized that training, obtaining a motorcycle driving license, and complying with the safety requirements and traffic safety instructions help prevent accidents.
Furthermore, Fadila Al Muaini (Journalist) considered that reckless motorcycle driving borders on suicide. She called on relevant authorities to combat “daredevils”, highlighting the seriousness of the phenomenon, which is spreading among young people, and its impact on environmental components.
Al Muaini expressed the need to tighten control to curb reckless driving and acrobatic stunts, adding that this requires quick and decisive decisions, to put an end to accidents and their resulting casualties and tragic endings.
Furthermore, she called for preventing the export and sale of unlicensed motorcycles, even if they are consistent with the traffic requirements, standards and technical specifications. She also called for supervising shops and outlets that sell those bikes, as well as the mechanical workshops in industrial areas that make random technical specifications to those bikes, which increases their power and make them more dangerous to use.
Al Muaini described the students’ holidays as the “season of death”, indicating that the mid-term holidays are a difficult period for students who do not join clubs and training camps, or take up constructive activities. She noted that families should be cautious, and supervise their children to prevent any bad behavior that may eventually lead to deadly accidents and undesirable ends.
“The family is in charge of protecting its children from traffic accidents while driving recklessly, whether they have a permit or not,” she continued.
She stated that, being a mother of three teenagers, and just like any other mother, she fears the tragic results of dangerous reckless driving and other negative practices that her children may encounter. Moreover, she noted that a significant number of Emirati families face this disturbing and recurring problem; calling on concerned entities to strengthen their cooperation and take crucial peremptory decisions; our so that children and their families can enjoy stability.
She expressed her reticence to the calls for establishing specialized rinks for motorcycles or other vehicles stunts, whether in sandy areas or in any other places, arguing that such circuits are “death circuits”, although approved formally.
In the same vein, citizens and residents blamed the community for the motorcycle reckless driving phenomenon. They indicated that parents who comply with their children’s wish of owning a motorcycle, are living a constant dilemma; between allowing their children to enjoy their favorite hobbies, and how to control their behavior, to force them to comply with road ethics and etiquette.
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