At least one garment worker died and 12 others sustained injuries in a collision between a minibus they were travelling in and a truck in Cambodia’s Takeo province’s Bati District. Around 20 people were travelling on the bus, as reported.
The accident took place on National Road 2 on Saturday (March 17, 2018) at around 5 pm when victims were going home from their work, reportedly informed Chhorn Treoun, Deputy District Police Chief In Charge of Traffic. Injured workers were sent to the Bati district referral hospital for treatment.
It has also been reported that while some of the workers sustained serious injuries, others met with minor.
The truck driver has been arrested and sent to the district police station for questioning.
Notably, Cambodia reported a 56 per cent decline in the number of road accidents from 7,592 cases in 2016 to a total of 3,330 road accidents in 2017. This was stated in an annual report released by the National Social Security Fund (NSSF) last week.
These road accidents are demoralising the workers and thereby damaging the productivity of the Cambodian garment industry. The country reported at least 33 deaths and 2,193 injuries in a total of 1,691 road accidents involving garment workers in the year 2017.
Garment workers reportedly face accidents on an almost daily basis. A total of 68 garment workers lost their lives in road accidents, 683 sustained serious injuries while 4,102 workers received minor injuries in 2017.
A national policy, aimed to improve roads and infrastructure, increase vehicle safety and eradicate the management’s oversight of the issue, was launched by Ministry of Labour this year.
The Cambodian Government also announced last year that it was considering to construct a railway line connecting Phnom Penh and select provinces to SEZs and industrial areas in view of the high number of road accidents involving commuting workers. Any update on the same is yet to be received.
