Truckers oppose new axle load rule

Truckers have demanded the withdrawal of a new rule meant to check overloading.

The transporters threatened to remove their trucks from the road if the rule was not withdrawn.

Road Transport Association (RTA) officials said transporters, with a fleet of 24,000 trucks, want the government to use Gross Vehicle Weight (GVW) to check overloading as happens in the other East Africa Community countries.

“We wish to state that we strongly oppose the move to implement the axle load control because the distribution of the cargo is done at the loading point and we may not know how it is distributed even though the container is within the required limit,” RTA executive officer Meriana Singo said.

Kenya National Highway Authority, in a notice last week, announced that Rule 41 in the Traffic Act, which requires the vehicles to be weighed for GVW and individual axles, would be re-introduced from Monday after it was suspended last year.

The regulations governing overloading in Kenya allow trucks to have a maximum of three axles, each weighing eight tonnes.

In October 2008, President Kibaki issued a directive reducing the number of axles allowed on Kenyan roads from four to three, lowering the limit of the gross weight of a truck to 48 tonnes.

“We note with concern that no attention is given to stop overload of containers from the point of loading, since this would have been the best way forward to allow permissible weight containers through the port,” Ms Singo said.

She added that the government’s failure to harmonise its axle load limits rules with other East Africa countries was leading to huge losses.