Before the 2024 Christmas holiday, we brought you a story of how some Abuja residents put their lives at risk running across the highway sometimes right under foot bridges.

In concluding part of the story, correspondent Josephine Bitrus examines the altitude of the law to this habit of attempted suicide?

For a number of Abuja residents, returning from the Christmas and New Year holidays, coming back, turned to a brush with death.

For some, carrying loads on their heads and dragging along young children, running across the Abuja highways became a last call. But the law is ambivalent about this traffic risk.

The Federal Road Safety Commission says there is no law against running across the highway even right under a footbridge.

That explains why even Police and Federal Road Safety officials stop vehicular traffic right under footbridges, to all Pedestrians cross.

However, some Lawyers told our Correspondent that indeed any act, willfully undertaken knowing that it puts people in harm way is a crime.
It does not matter whether it is traffic related or not

Uche Collins, a campaigner against the habit of crossing roads, identified the absence of Zebra crossings, failure by commercial drivers to drop passengers at designated bus stops as some reasons why people cross roads.

The Lagos State authorities have identified the need to create a legal framework for addressing this challenge. There may be a need for specific law against this suicide on the highways.