A tragedy happens.
The country wakes up.
Meetings are held. Statements are released. Authorities promise that “this must never happen again.”
Then, after a respectful period of mourning, life slowly returns to normal.
Road safety appears to follow the same script.
Since mabybe Saturday, Kampala’s roads have looked slightly different. Suddenly, traffic rules have regained their importance. Bus operators appear to remember that passengers are human beings. Traffic officers appear unusually interested in enforcement.
It is almost as if tragedy is the one traffic officer Uganda never ignores.
The question is not whether Uganda knows the rules.
We do.
We know vehicles should be inspected. We know drivers should follow safety regulations. We know passengers should not be treated like luggage being squeezed into every available space.
The question is why we wait for loss before remembering what we already knew.
And when the passengers are children, the excuses become even harder to accept.
Children do not inspect tyres before boarding. They do not check brake systems. They do not question whether a driver is tired or whether a vehicle is fit for the journey.
They simply get on the bus.
They laugh. They sing. They look forward to their trip.
They trust the adults responsible for bringing them home.
That trust should never be treated as a business calculation.
Because children are not numbers on a passenger list. They are not extra seats to fill. They are not cargo.
But perhaps we should not celebrate this sudden wave of discipline too quickly.
Uganda has seen this movie before.
After every major tragedy, the country discovers the laws it already had.
After Sydney Gongodyo’s death following an alleged mob justice incident, the country once again confronted the danger of a society where anger can sometimes move faster than justice. For a moment, conversations about accountability and the rule of law dominated public attention.
In Karamoja, years of warnings about hunger, poverty and insecurity often struggled to attract the same urgency that came after the situation became a national emergency. Suddenly, attention, resources and concern became more visible — after the suffering had already reached a devastating point.
Then, as always, another story arrived.
This is perhaps our greatest weakness: not ignorance, but forgetfulness.
We do not lack rules. We lack consistency.
The first week after a tragedy, everyone remembers responsibility. The second week, the urgency fades. By the third week, we are back to negotiating with danger as if safety is a luxury and not a basic requirement.
The tragedy is not that Uganda does not know how to prevent these deaths.
The tragedy is that we often remember prevention only after the funeral.
So the question is not only: how many buses must crash?
It is also: how many families must mourn before safety becomes a habit rather than a reaction?