【こぼれ話】ウガンダ交易組織、女性のトラック同乗禁止　太ももで注意力低下

【カンパラＡＦＰ＝時事】ウガンダ北部リラ市の交易組織は、トラックの助手席に女性を乗せることを禁止した。ミニスカートで太ももをあらわにした女性がいると運転手が心を乱し、交通事故を引き起こす恐れがあるためと説明している。（写真は資料写真）
　交通安全対策が目的で、たとえ妻であっても乗せることはできない。
　交易組織のパトリック・オピオ・オボテ代表は１９日、「丈の短いワンピースを着た女性がいると、運転手が太ももに気を取られて死亡事故につながる恐れがある」とＡＦＰに語った。
　交易組織の独自調査によると、交通事故の原因には速度超過などの交通違反だけでなく、丈の短いワンピースを着た女性を助手席に乗せていたり、運転手がそうした女性とバーで酒を飲んでいたりしていたケースもあった。
　一方、女性の権利擁護活動家のアリス・ムグワンヤ・カビジェ氏はこの規則について、不要であり「男性優越主義」の表れと批判。女性の服装を交通事故の原因とするのは的外れであり、性差別的な取り扱いを禁止するウガンダ憲法に違反すると主張した。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】

〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/01/21-11:37）

A traders association in northern Uganda has banned women from riding up front in trucks after deciding that short skirts and bare thighs could be distracting drivers and causing accidents.
The order handed down in Lira city prohibits drivers from permitting even their wives in the front cabin of lorries.
An association representing local traders and vendors said the decision banning female passengers was made in the name of safety.
Some of them wear short dresses which expose their thighs and distract drivers, and the drivers end up causing accidents and people on board die, Patrick Opio Obote, chairman of Lira's mobile market vendors group, told AFP Wednesday.
The ban takes immediate effect and all drivers and passengers are complying.
Obote said the decision was taken after examining the cause of road accidents in the area involving truck drivers.
We discovered other than high speed and indiscipline of truck drivers, some women sit in front cabin while wearing short dresses, some take the drivers to bars and drink alcohol and the drivers end up causing accidents, he said.
The ban follows an accident on January 10 in which nine traders died and 20 others were injured when a truck returning from a weekly market near Lira overturned.
Police blamed speed and reckless driving for the crash.
Women's rights activist Alice Mugwanya Kabijje said the edict was unnecessary and male chauvinism in action.
This is another attack on women by the officials in Lira, Mugwanya told AFP.
It is totally against the constitution of Uganda where exclusion of a certain gender to freely participate in the daily work is prohibited.
The attribution of a dress code to a road accident is clumsy reasoning and an indicator of how a woman is still segregated in our societies and men prefer them to stay in the kitchen, she said.
Local media quoted Uganda's deputy director of traffic and road safety as saying Lira fell within a region with the second-highest rate of traffic accidents over the recent festive period.