| Izah Azahari |
INFORMATION on the New Car Assessment Programme (NCAP) system was distributed to the public by members of the Brunei National Road Safety Council (BNRSC) during the Royal Birthday Cycling Recreation 2018 event yesterday.
The BNRSC was one of a number of bodies and organisations participating in the sports/cycling exhibition held at Taman Haji Sir Muda Omar ‘Ali Saifuddien alongside Bandarku Ceria and as a side activity to the main cycling event.
The distribution activity, held in collaboration with the Brunei Automobile Traders Association (BATA) with support from Maju Motors Sdn Bhd and NBT (Brunei) Sdn Bhd, was aimed at relaying to the public the importance of factoring the NCAP system into their thinking when making car buying decisions.
The NCAP system is an European vehicle safety performance programme that assesses the performance design of vehicles in alignment with various security threats via a star rating system based on crash tests.
On July 1, this year, a law was passed requiring all car dealerships in the country to clearly show the NCAP star ratings and/or safety features of the cars on display in their showrooms or in advertisements.
Besides details on the NCAP system, the information highlights the importance of a vehicle’s safety features in preventing serious road accidents and reducing the chances of driver and passenger injury.
Present during the distribution activity was Acting Minister of Communications Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Ali bin Haji Apong.
Also present were Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Communications (MinCom) Haji Azhar bin Haji Ahmad in his capacity as Deputy Chairman II of BNRSC, as well as Deputy Permanent Secretary at the MinCom Dr Haji Supry bin Haji Awang Ladi in his capacity as Secretary of BNRSC.
The distribution activity was accompanied by a road safety quiz offering winners miscellaneous prizes and fuel vouchers sponsored by Maju Motors Sdn Bhd, as well as a showcase of new vehicles displaying the NCAP star rating and vehicle safety features.
Other activities included an airbag safety replacement campaign by NBT (Brunei) Sdn Bhd. The activity was run to further inform Toyota car owners in the country of the need to have their cars’ airbags replaced, following the recall of 20 million Toyota vehicles worldwide due to faulty Takata airbags which have been found to inflate spontaneously and burst during accidents.
At present, BATA is working closely with the Land Transport Department to contact the owners of all affected vehicles to have the problem airbags replaced.