Road safety: NTSA issues new rules to help curb road carnage

George Kebaso and Gillian Seka @PeopleDailyKe

The government, through the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA), yesterday spelt out new measures to enhance road safety.

Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i announced the deregistration of 300 driving schools that were not qualified to conduct training.

“The driving schools recently failed a revalidation exercise that sought to establish levels of compliance with the provisions and requirements for driving school registration,” he said at the NTSA headquarters yesterday. 

During the launch of the National Transport Reforms Conference, Matiang’i said the government is set to implement far-reaching reforms in the transport sector as outlined in the National Road Safety Action Plan 2019–2023. 

Matiang’i said defective driver training, testing and licensing system has been one of the major contributors of road accidents. “This has been aggravated by the recent proliferation of backstreet driving schools,” he stated. 

Data with NTSA shows that only 35 Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institutions had qualified for the test of becoming a training centres for drivers.

Matiang’i said enforcement regimes would ensure law implementation on roads as we approach the holiday season from next month. “The stakeholders on ground and the government should support NTSA to win the hearts of people in following the road safety measures,” he said.

Integrated policy

He said plans are at an advanced stage to review the national integrated policy that would guide transport and increase quality of infrastructure.

“Urban mobility and congestion will also be looked at in order to emerge with modern facility to facilitate development,” he added.

The CS said the government will not turn away from the atrocities committed on the roads by half-baked drivers.

“The government will remain non-compromising on the standards and quality of driver training,” he added.

NTSA director general Francis Meja said, so far, short-term interventions the authority had mounted in partnership with various stakeholders have yielded a 50 per cent reduction in road fatalities.

Matiang’i directed that with effect from November 1, no PSV or commercial service driver’s licence will be renewed without the holder undergoing a mandatory retraining and retesting process in accordance with the newly prescribed modules.