Top �� What's up around the Prime Minister �� May, 2003

Prime Minister Attends the Central Meeting of the Traffic Safety Campaign Monday, May 12, 2003 Click photographs to enlarge Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi attended the Central Meeting of the National Spring Traffic Safety Campaign at Onarimon Elementary School in Minato Ward, Tokyo. This Campaign is held with the goal of widely promoting and enhancing understanding of traffic safety among the people in order to build a society with a safe traffic. At the school, Prime Minister Koizumi told the children that well over 100 U.S. soldiers had lost their lives in the recent War against Iraq, and said, "Here in our safe nation more than 8,000 people died in a traffic accident last year. I aim to decrease the number of traffic deaths by half, with an initial goal of 5,000. I would like to call on all of you to be careful not to be involved in any traffic accidents." Then, Prime Minister Koizumi handed traffic safety slogans that he himself had written to representatives of the children and of the elderly. Furthermore, in a traffic safety quiz he personally wore a suit and tie made of reflective materials. As part of a lecture on traffic safety, Prime Minister Koizumi took a test drive with an electric-powered wheelchair once around the test course in the schoolyard. After the drive he recounted his impressions, saying, "It was easy to drive. As it does not go fast, we can have a safe drive."