Personal safety is our responsibility

VICTIMS of road bullies, traffic accidents, snatch thefts, robberies and assaults are bound to be disappointed if they expect the public to come running to help them.

This is not because people are not willing to help but onlookers and passers-by would have to first make out what is happening before they can react. Even victims of snatch thefts take a few seconds to realise what is happening, allowing the thieves to make a head start before the alarm is raised.

The public is also unlikely to intervene when victims who are being robbed or assaulted appear to be engaged in a fight.

If tailed or cut off by a road bully, the best recourse for a motorist is to stay inside the vehicle without unlocking the doors or lowering any of the windows.

If the road bully approaches, it would be wise to gesture humbly and apologetically regardless of who was at fault.

There is no need to keep blasting the horn if the road bully refuses to budge his car.

But these incidents would be recorded by smartphones if traffic is stationary, or by dashboard cameras fitted onto the vehicles.

One could drive straight into the compound of police stations before, but this changed after a mob attacked the Batu Pahat Police Station in October 1980. Casualties were too high to continue unrestricted entry into any police station after that incident.