Governor Okpebholo, You Didn’t Cause the Crisis—But Now It’s Yours to End: On 75 Deaths in 6 Months, Road Carnage, and the Urgent Need for Improvement -By John Egbeazien Oshodi

The Grief Behind the Numbers

Your Excellency, Governor Monday Okpebholo, it is with profound sorrow and moral urgency that I address this letter to you. According to the July 14, 2025 report from the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), a staggering 75 passengers were killed in road crashes across Edo State within the first six months of this year. That number is not just tragic; it is horrifying, shocking, and unacceptable. These 75 deaths occurred in 101 separate crashes involving 903 passengers, with an additional 304 persons sustaining injuries. These are not just faceless numbers—they are human beings, many of them ordinary citizens who left home expecting to arrive safely at their destinations but never returned. We are not speaking of a distant war zone. We are speaking of Edo—of your roads, Governor Okpebholo, of your people, and of a collapse of safety standards that demands immediate and unwavering attention.

To be clear, these statistics are not abstract. Behind every number is a family in mourning. A widow. A fatherless child. A grieving mother. Every funeral held in these past six months marks a policy failure. And if not confronted urgently, the next six months may bring even more tears, funerals, and unanswered questions.

No More Legal Distractions—Now, Face the Highways

As of July 14, 2025, the Supreme Court has affirmed your election and settled all legal disputes regarding the gubernatorial race. This victory provides you with full administrative freedom, moral license, and political clarity. The time for courtroom battles is over. What now demands your energy is a different kind of courtroom—the court of public conscience and the judgment of human life.

This road carnage is not just an administrative challenge—it is a moral reckoning. Will your government be remembered for law and order, or for looking the other way as citizens died in the dust and blood of preventable crashes? The opportunity before you is historic: to bring decisive leadership to one of the most neglected public safety disasters in the state’s history.

The Month-by-Month Horror—A Disgrace to Governance

The monthly breakdown is not just data—it is a funeral march: 15 deaths in January, 18 in February, 14 in March, 4 in April, 5 in May, and a horrifying 19 in June. That spike in June is a symptom of both indifference and decay. If a building collapsed and killed 19 people in a single month, there would be outrage. But road deaths seem to slip past our outrage. That silence is also a form of violence.

These deaths were caused by well-known hazards: overspeeding, drunk driving, faulty brakes, mechanical defects, mobile phone use while driving, and total disregard for traffic codes. Each of these issues represents not just individual irresponsibility, but a collective failure of the system to educate, regulate, and enforce. That is the deeper horror. These are not acts of God. They are acts of neglect.

Leadership Is Protection, Not Performance

Governance is not simply about budgets, roads, and public appearances. At its core, it is about protecting life. No governor should be praised for commissioning projects while funerals multiply from state-enabled lawlessness. Leadership must go beyond symbolic gestures. It must become a shield for the vulnerable.

The everyday citizen expects to return home alive. When that expectation is repeatedly violated, something deep in the civic soul begins to break. What we are witnessing is not just road collapse—it is institutional decay. And your silence in the face of it would be interpreted as indifference.

What Developed Nations Do That We Fail To Do

In nations where lives are valued, every road journey is governed by discipline—because discipline is systematized. Licensing is earned, not bought. Testing is transparent, not compromised. Law enforcement is empowered and supervised. Drivers are subject to background checks, medical reviews, and technology-enhanced monitoring. What does Edo offer in return?

In Edo, a 15-year-old can get a commercial license through bribery. In Edo, trailers with blown tires, no lights, and broken axles speed past police checkpoints with impunity. In Edo, night buses overloaded with passengers run without inspection, and commercial vehicles have side mirrors that are broken, taped up, or missing altogether. The state of vehicle disrepair is shocking: bald tires that barely hold grip, engines that smoke like factories, windshields that look like spider webs, and brake lights that don’t work.

In developed societies, such a vehicle would never leave the yard. Here, they dominate the roads. The message is clear: regulation exists only in theory. And the cost is human life.

Concrete Actions You Must Take Now

Track the Dead and the Injured—And Stand in the Gap for the Forgotten

Governor Okpebholo, one critical but overlooked area is the lack of structured tracking, care, and support for road crash victims. Your Ministry of Health must immediately create a state-run registry of all individuals injured or killed in road crashes. This is not just about data collection—it is about ensuring no victim becomes invisible.

We know that in Nigeria, most citizens do not have access to health insurance, let alone automobile insurance. Many of the injured suffer in silence, unable to afford surgeries, long-term rehabilitation, or even transportation to medical centers. The dead are buried without public accountability. Families absorb the trauma, the cost, and the loss—alone.

This must change. The State must take responsibility where private systems have failed. Set up a dedicated Victim Support Desk under the Ministry of Health. Deploy social workers and public health responders to follow up on every recorded accident. Provide financial relief packages for the severely injured, orphans, and widowed families. Track outcomes over time. Publish anonymized, quarterly reports. Let Edo become the first Nigerian state to institutionalize human dignity in the aftermath of public tragedy.

Each reform below is not just a technical recommendation—it is a moral obligation:

Reform Driver Licensing: Implement a full audit of all existing commercial driver licenses. Launch biometric re-certification. All drivers must undergo routine vision tests, physical exams, and simulation-based retesting.

Enforce Drug and Alcohol Screening: Develop a monthly drug-testing protocol for commercial drivers and public transport operators. Install breathalyzer checkpoints at night-time departure points. Partner with addiction specialists for referral of repeat offenders.

Ban All Unroadworthy Vehicles: Set up mobile inspection squads. Vehicles with non-functioning mirrors, brake lights, cracked windshields, and engine leakage must be banned. Any vehicle emitting continuous smoke should be reported, tracked, and scrapped.

Mandatory Insurance and Victim Support: Collaborate with insurers to subsidize basic third-party coverage. Make it illegal to operate commercial vehicles without active policies. Establish a Road Victim Trust Fund, funded by transport levies and state allocations.

Strict Monitoring of Vehicle Load and Speed: Equip buses with GPS trackers to detect overspeeding. Implement instant fine systems. Train officials to weigh vehicles using calibrated mobile scales and publish weekly enforcement data.

Create a Real-Time Public Complaint System: Establish a 24/7 call center and SMS code for passengers. Install dashboard camera programs with incentives for drivers who opt-in. Give the public the power to record and report.

Launch an Independent Road Safety Integrity Task Force: This multi-stakeholder unit must have judicial backing, FRSC partnership, and budgetary autonomy. Let it have disciplinary powers over police, road officers, and regulatory agencies.

Partner Broadly with FRSC: Create a joint command center with real-time traffic monitoring. Share accident data publicly. Launch co-branded road awareness campaigns targeting schools, markets, and motor parks.

Fix the Roads or Litigate: Commission an independent audit of all federal roads in Edo. Identify high-risk corridors. File suit for neglect if repairs are denied. Mobilize citizen petitions and legal pressure.

Hold Police Accountable: Record and publish every traffic officer’s enforcement history. Use bodycams. Reward ethical conduct and prosecute misconduct. Make non-reporting of road violations a criminal offense.

Illuminate Danger Zones: Partner with engineers to install solar-powered smart lights at black spots. Use accident mapping to determine where visibility failures most contribute to fatalities.

Coordinate Emergency Medical Response: Develop trauma response units with motorcycle paramedics. Map hospitals based on proximity to highways. Use toll booth revenues to fund highway ambulances.

Punish Compromised Law Enforcement—Bribery is Bloodshed

Your Excellency, the culture of impunity that shields compromised officers must end. Create a zero-tolerance framework for bribe-based clearance of unfit vehicles. Establish an anonymous whistleblower system with rewards. Announce weekly enforcement updates. Publish names and offenses of dismissed officers.

Because every bribe exchanged on a highway is a betrayal of the people. Every unfit truck waved through a checkpoint is a coffin in motion. And every silence from leadership is complicity in the bloodshed.

Shift the Psychological Climate—Let the People See You Mean It

The change must be visible. Road users must begin to feel watched—not by predators, but by protectors. Drivers must fear penalties and respect boundaries. Officers must fear exposure. Citizens must feel empowered to speak. Governance must be felt—not just seen at ribbon-cuttings, but experienced in the assurance of life.

Safety is not just a function of infrastructure—it is a function of psychology. Let Edo citizens feel that their lives matter to you. That is when behavior changes.

Your Legacy is Being Written Already

Governor Monday Okpebholo, the judgment of time is not always visible at the moment of action—but it is always written in memory. You now stand at the crossroads of legacy. Will you walk the path of courageous reform, or retreat into the shadow of quiet indifference?

Governance begins with protection. This is your moment to protect. This is your chance to save lives not with slogans, but with systems. Act now.

The Final Plea

Your Excellency, let it be clearly stated: you did not cause this crisis. You are not responsible for the decades of neglect, indiscipline, and broken enforcement structures that led us here. You are not to blame for the crumbling roads or the long-standing corruption that enabled these dangerous practices. You have only just emerged from a prolonged legal battle to affirm your mandate.

But now, that mandate is secure—and with it comes both opportunity and responsibility. You may not have created this deadly system, but you are now the only one with the power to transform it. The bloodshed on Edo roads cannot continue. The time for hesitation is over. History will not remember when you were sworn in, only what you did once you were.

Declare a Statewide Road Safety Emergency. Reform the licensing system. Punish corrupt enforcers. Remove killer vehicles. Protect innocent passengers. Fix the roads. Light the danger zones. Sue when justice fails. Partner where solutions exist. Speak life into a dying road culture.

Because right now, Governor—this is shocking. This is bad. This must end.

Sincerely,

Psychologist John Egbeazien Oshodi

Professor John Egbeazien Oshodi is an American psychologist, educator, and author with deep expertise in forensic, legal, and clinical psychology, cross-cultural psychology, and police and prison science. Born in Uromi, Edo State, Nigeria, and the son of a 37-year veteran of the Nigeria Police Force, his early immersion in law enforcement laid the foundation for a lifelong commitment to justice, institutional transformation, and psychological empowerment.

In 2011, he introduced state-of-the-art forensic psychology to Nigeria through the National Universities Commission and Nasarawa State University, where he served as Associate Professor of Psychology. Over the decades, he has taught at Florida Memorial University, Florida International University, Broward College (as Assistant Professor and Interim Associate Dean), Nova Southeastern University, and Lynn University. He currently teaches at Walden University and holds virtual academic roles with Weldios University and ISCOM University.

In the U.S., Prof. Oshodi serves as a government consultant in forensic-clinical psychology and leads professional and research initiatives through the Oshodi Foundation, the Center for Psychological and Forensic Services. He is the originator of Psychoafricalysis, a culturally anchored psychological model that integrates African sociocultural realities, historical memory, and symbolic-spiritual consciousness—offering a transformative alternative to dominant Western psychological paradigms.

A proud Black Republican, Professor Oshodi is a strong advocate for ethical leadership, institutional accountability, and renewed bonds between Africa and its global diaspora—working across borders to inspire psychological resilience, systemic reform, and forward-looking public dialogue.