WHY should 38 people die in a single boat mishap? The reasons centre on the same neglect that attends almost all aspects of our national life. There were no emergency services to rescue them in an accident that happened in the Rumuolumeni area of Port Harcourt. It would not have made any difference if this accident was in the centre of Abuja.

Emergency services do not work. They are not meant to work. The absence of co-ordination among them ensures that when accidents occur, uncertainty about whose responsibility it is to re-act, or sheer indifference produce high death figures.

We have witnessed many instances of buildings collapsing in Abuja only for the emergency services to discover they do not have appropriate tools to rescue those trapped in the debris. At other times, the response time is so poor that more lives are lost than would have been the case if help arrived earlier.

The simple explanation for these rests on the low appreciation of the importance of emergency services. Most people appointed to positions in these areas work regular hours and make no provisions for the “unexpected”, which is what emergencies are. There are no emergency plans beside the academic papers they present annually.

What measures should people who witnessed the accident have taken? Where were the emergency lines they should have called? Does anyone man those lines? Do the emergency agencies know about the volume of traffic on our water ways? Do they know when traffic stops on those routes? Do they have procedures for initiating and executing an emergency plan?

Emergencies do not serve notice. Even on our roads with all the police presence, rescue plans do not exist. After accidents, it is other road users who provide the initial emergency services without the skills or equipment they required.

Often more lives are lost in the absence of the professionals. The easiest option is to make excuses about logistics and poor funding of these agencies. These excuses becloud the inefficiency of the emergency services while their officials are busy claiming territory.

The services do not work together, leading to duplication of efforts and wastes. There are no public enlightenment programmes on emergency services. After making excuses, the next step is to blame either the victims or circumstances.

In the Port Harcourt incident, some residents of the Ngbuodohia waters are blaming bad roads. They reasoned that if the roads  were good the passengers would not have travelled by boat. This position is defeatist. Water transportation is viable and safe in other places where accidents occur in bad weather or overloaded boats.

Those places have good roads, but water transportation is developed. For Nigeria’s numerous coastal communities, water transportation is a way of life. The cost of road construction in those areas would limit road transportation while water transportation should thrive.

Outside poor emergency services, other reasons that could have caused the accident are overloading, poorly maintained boats and low visibility (the accident occurred about 9pm).

Governments, by lifting the safety standards of water transportation, can prevent these deaths. The emergency services need to redefine their roles. More proactive tactics will get more beneficial results than arriving at the scene to evacuate the dead.