Nairobi Senator Johnson Sakaja has criticized the move by Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) to ban matatus from accessing the CBD from December 1, 2020.
Speaking in the Senate on Tuesday, November 24, Senator Sakaja said that NMS had not addressed critical areas such as how passengers would commute to different termini within the city.
“Imagine a sick old man or a woman being dropped at Globe Cinema to walk all the way to Uhuru Highway across here to Railway Golf Club to get a matatu to Kenyatta National Hospital,” the legislator explained.
He stated that without addressing that concern, NMS would be discriminating against Nairobians who cannot afford cars.
“In fact, if anything, private vehicles are causing more congestion in the city than the public vehicles. One matatu is taking 30 people, while you find one individual driving a car.
“Until they've provided a proper alternative for the ordinary mwananchi, let that ban not be put in force,” he argued.
A similar ban by Nairobi City County Government in 2018 caused anguish to passengers.
Some commuters from Jogoo Road to Westlands had to walk from City Stadium to Fig Tree in Ngara to board a matatu to Westlands.
That same year, Senator Sakaja moved to court to suspend the ban.
He faulted Governor Mike Sonko’s administration for ejecting the matatus from the city centre without providing convenient alternatives, thereby leaving commuters stranded.
“The move by Governor Mike Sonko to ban matatus from the CBD is premature, and unfair to ordinary citizens. You don’t ban matatus before providing alternatives for commuters,” he told the court.
Solving Nairobi's perennial traffic problem has been a headache for both the county and national governments over the years.
