RIP Nian Ning

Lee Nian Ning, a fellow Penangite, passed away in a tragic bus accident a few days ago. She was at the peak of her life, a bright shining future ahead of her but all of these were robbed away in just seconds. The bus she was in hit a divider and the MPV behind, unable to stop in time, crashed into the back of the bus (More info).

The bus driver was later on found to have 13 outstanding summonses dating back as far as 2000 and a witness told the Berita Harian that the driver was speeding while sending text messages just before the accident happened!

How the heck can anyone with so many summonses not have their driver's licence revoked? For such a looooong period of time too! Plus they had TWO warrants of arrest for him!! And what has our police force been doing all this time? Writing summonses for illegal parking in housing estates, university/college areas and coffee shop areas. Catching people for not wearing seatbelts. The list goes on.... I'm not saying that any of the above are right or that the police shouldn't be catching those people. All I'm saying is that instead, they ought to concentrate on catching repeated offenders for speeding, reckless driving and the like. And especially those who hold many lives in their hands each time they get behind the wheel.

Then there's the bus company- Konsortium. Shouldn't they have checked out their potential drivers before hiring them? And considering that their buses make several trips to and fro from various states in the country, shouldn't they make an effort to make sure the buses are in reasonable condition and not break down half-way through the journey? And couldn't they have at least apologized and send condolences to the families involved? Or did they think that if they just kept quiet, the whole fiasco would eventually die down and business would go back to normal-until the next accident at least.

Well, all I know is that Konsortium is now synonymous with Irresponsible and we're all boycotting them. There are so many other affordable buses out there- Plusliner for example.

I mean, who knows when the next accident might be?

I'm sure not gonna stick around and find out.
-scoobz-