It is agencies, not motorists, that need scrutiny

The National Safety and Transport Authority has a unique opportunity to improve Kenya’s “roadworthiness”. 

As a lead agency, it has the mandate to examine policies and practices that affect every aspect of roads, vehicles and their use, and overhaul not just parts but the entire system.

For example, until now, vehicle standards have been set by KeBS, inspection done at Vehicle Inspection Centres, and compliance enforced by Traffic Police. 

Each has own policies and all have operated their systems without any co-ordination or regard for the many factors that impact on transport conduct and performance.

INSPECTION CENTRES

So our efforts to improve traffic flow or safety are never concerted or coordinated, and piecemeal actions are riddled with anomalies stating roadworthiness as a priority while giving tax incentives to the importation of old and sub-standard vehicles is a profound contradiction.

KeBS sets a blanket Technical Standard (KS1515) with which all vehicles should comply, but has no say on whether or how such standards are prioritised, checked or enforced. 

The Standard draws no distinction, and offers no guidelines, on the difference between safety-critical and cosmetic defects.

Vehicle Inspection Centres have the mandate to inspect only some vehicles, and only annually,  and lack the skills, capacity and discipline to do even that partial job. 

There is no certainty of whether, what or how checks are conducted;  the outcomes of  “pass” or “fail” (there are no other options) have no formally defined benchmark, based on safety-critical or other criteria.   

Traffic Police conduct spot checks with motives and methods almost entirely disconnected from any other or overall strategy or context.

Their technical qualifications (certification), selection of check priorities (whom decides? How?) and discretionary powers to warn or prosecute are random and based on a rationale known only to them.

These three pillars of vehicle roadworthiness regulation (KeBS, Inspection Centres and Police) have considerable authority in their own limited spheres but they are neither harmonised nor correlated with each other, and the exercise of their authority and the performance of their duty is itself not regulated. 

GARGANTUAN TASK

They are a law unto themselves.

Their existence and operations do make an indirect contribution to public awareness and impose some pressure on compliance, but their impact on overall roadworthiness standards is minimal and the impact of that on road safety is nearly nil. 

The purpose they serve most effectively is revenue collection, without accountable purpose.

This is what NTSA must remedy. The task is gargantuan. 

We wait, with patience and ready supplies of sympathy, for signs that it has begun. Our hope is that NTSA will start, for the first time ever, by addressing the causes of problems, not just their effects. 

And that means giving priority to fixing the way the system is designed and managed.

It is the authorities, not motorists, that most need thorough inspection and constant roadside checks.