Precision Air Plane Crash Reveals Capitalist Irresponsibility

News:

Precision Air plane, Flight PW494, 48-seater twin turboprop 5H-PWF, ATR42-500 – with 43 people on board which was flying from Dar es Salaam to Bukoba, Kagera Region, crashed into Lake Victoria in Bukoba on Sunday, 06/11/2022 at around 8:53am. The accident caused the loss of 19 people as confirmed by both, Precision Air and the Tanzania Civil Aviation Authority (TCAA)

Comment:

We sincerely convey our condolences to families of the deceased and wishing the victims a fast recovery. Regarding this crash, it seemed that there is a sense of irresponsibility on responding to this accident. The plane crashed in attempt to land in stormy weather at Bukoba Airport close to Lake Victoria, whereby no rapid search and rescue team sent to a fuselage floating in shallow water. It is believed that it was only 100m from the lake shore. (Mwananchi Newspaper 10/11/2022).

Also, as reported by VoaSwahili on 06/11/2022 and confirmed by Mwanza Regional Commissioner (Mr. Albert Chalamila) in his interview with East Africa radio on 06/11/2022 shortly before crash, there was a communication between the pilots, control towers and other government officials. If that was the case, why didn’t the rescue team arrive on time and so resulted into more deaths up to 19 people who, if the rescue team arrived early, might have been saved?

This fatal accident confirmed a shortage of divers and rescue equipment which made instead a lot of rescue work being undertaken by fishermen or ordinary people around the lake shore. Passengers who were saved alive were only those who were able to get out after the flight attendant opened the flight back door, and the dead could not be taken out until the plane was moved near to the shore.

Amazingly, this is not the first time that flight accidents occurred and it seems to have learnt nothing as far as rescue is concerned. On November 1997, a Piper PA 31-350 crashed on the Kibo wing of Mount Kilimanjaro at 15,400 feet in bad weather, and on December 2018, a Precision Air ATR-72 was hit by a flock of birds before landing at the Mwanza Airport and in February 2022 a flight owned by Fly Zanzibar Limited crashed into the sea off the coast of Comoros, with 14 people on board. These are just few examples, yet nothing has been done to improve emergency response services.

This scenario exposes intrinsic nature of the capitalist ideology which does not care about the lives and the welfare of human being. In addition, it is a vivid indication of its lack of seriousness in dealing with vital issues even of life and death.

Developing nations and the world in general need a just and a fair ideology, which is Islam, via its Khilafah (Caliphate) state that will care about humankind, their wellbeing and lives, since it has pure spiritual strength of linking every action for being accounted in the Hereafter.

Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by
Said Bitomwa
Member of the Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir in Tanzania