The National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA), on Thursday, July 16, suffered a blow after the High Court termed one of its project as illegal.
Citizen TV was the first to report that Justice Weldon Korir termed the plan by the authority to phase out 14-seater matatus in the country's major towns as illegal.
The project was to kick off in Nairobi, Mombasa and Kisumu.
The judge cited lack of public participation in NTSA's plan to implement the project as a determinant for his ruling.
“It was incumbent upon the makers of the regulations to demonstrate that the public was involved in the enactment of the regulations. The respondents have failed to prove that there was public participation in the enactment of the impugned regulation,” ruled Korir.
January 2019 reports indicated that the state had began phasing out matatus to ease congestion and disorder, common in major urban areas.
NTSA had started carrying out the exercise by stopping the licensing of 14-seater matatus.
Only 24 out of nearly 200 saccos operating the 14-seater matatus at the time were having their operating permits renewed after obtaining temporary court orders stopping the regulator from denying them licences.
The Association of Matatu operators objected the directive arguing that the authority had not notified operators of the plan leading to loss of millions in revenue.
“The government and NTSA did not notify us about the phasing out of the 14-seater capacity matatus, no official communication was done hence creating more tension in the industry, we are business people like any others in the country why shouldn’t the relevant authorities consult and plan in a manner that we are not frustrated,” they lamented at the time.
The association later moved to court accusing NTSA of discrimination in implementing the High Court order.
Economic Survey data indicated at the time that there were more than 37,000 14-seater matatus on Kenyan roads.
A total of 1,022 people lost their lives in the first quarter of 2020 compared to 1,058 who died in 2019 according to NTSA.
