In its continued bid to reduce accidents on the roads, Petroleum Importers Limited (PIL), the major fuel importer for Malawi in collaboration with International Haulage Brokers (IHB) have trained truck drivers that carry fuel into the country on safety and defensive driving.
This is part of the training series that PIL conducts for truck drivers across the country annually in major cities of Blantyre, Lilongwe and Mzuzu.
Speaking during the two-day training at Malawi Institute of Management (MIM) in Lilongwe, PIL Operations Manager Edmond Pingani said the company takes safety as an integral component of its operations.
“As PIL, we take safety very seriously and is our number one priority when it comes to fuel importation and transportation and we believe our drivers should also be treated as a priority when it comes to their safety and that of the goods that they transport,” said Pingani.
He added that the safety trainings are part of PIL’s preventative measures to ensure there is reduction of accidents on the roads.
“We started these trainings last year targeting drivers and they are conducted in three phases covering the three regions and this year we started in Blantyre and after Lilongwe training will be in Mzuzu. As you aware we carry a product which is highly flammable so we want to train drivers so that they know the goods are dangerous as such safety is critical for our business and any incident on the road is taken very serious and this training will make sure that our drivers are fully aware on what they need to go through in order to drive and come home safely,” he said.
He said the trainings have been of tremendous significance in PIL’s efforts to reduce accidents involving trucks.
IHB General Manager Chrispin Mussa said by the end of the training, drivers will be equipped with knowledge on how they can avoid accidents on the roads.
“This training is very important not only to drivers but also to transporters in Malawi as a whole because it involves mainly on safety improvement. The training helps our drivers to be aware of hazard on the roads and mitigate against them,” said Mussa.
One of truck drivers who attended the training Willies Ngolosa from National Wide Transport hailed PIL and IHB for conducting the safety training.
“This training is very important and it will help us drive safely and effectively therefore my advice to my colleagues is to apply what we have learnt so that we maintain safety on the roads,” said Ngolosa.
During the training, drivers were trained on the products knowledge, defensive driving, rollover protection and Fire control among others and the sessions were conducted by RoHaMa.
PIL HSSE manager Mr. Constance Msungeni trained the tanker drivers on fire control and how to use a fire extinguisher. The drivers demonstrated that in an event of small fires they could be capable of extinguishing the fire.
