Mini-buses shun speed governor law

Mar 12, 2007

MINI-BUSES (taxis) are the biggest defaulters on the law of speed governors, statistics from the licensing board at the ministry of transport indicate.

By Madinah Tebajjukira

MINI-BUSES (taxis) are the biggest defaulters on the law of speed governors, statistics from the licensing board at the ministry of transport indicate.

Out of 30,550 vehicles inspected by the ministry, only 4,364 had complied.

A total of 2,092 mini-buses out of the 20,000 surveyed had installed the speed governors, registering a 10% compliance.

Buses on the other hand recorded 91% compliance, with 503 trucks out of 550 fitting the gadgets.

The heavy trucks recorded 18% compliance, with 1,769 out of 10,000 installing the governors.

The Government passed the regulation in 2004 requiring all vehicles with a capacity of seven passengers and above, and over 3.5 tonnes to fix speed governors.

The gadgets, aimed at curbing road accidents, reduce the speed of vehicles to 80 km per hour.

The deadline for fixing the gadgets expired on February 13 and has not been extended.

It costs between sh250,000 and 600,000 to have the speed governors installed.
In a meeting last month, taxi owners and drivers under the Commercial Taxi Owners association, threatened to strike if the Police impounded their vehicles for refusing to install the gadgets.

“We shall not fix the speed governors until we have been given a forum to express our views. The speed governor deal is like that of the seat belts. They forced us to fix them and after getting a lot of money, nobody talks about them,” the association chairperson, Gadi Mugisha, lamented.

The drivers, also attribute the cause of accidents to potholes and lack of roadsigns. They add that the gadgets damage vehicle engines.

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