Road carnage in Kenya is on a roll. In the past 10 days alone, there have been horrendous accidents almost daily.

Seven people were killed at the Kamandura junction in Kiambu County on the Nairobi-Nakuru highway when the driver of a 14-seater matatu lost control and the vehicle overturned. Four other people were critically injured. Just the previous day at the same spot, five people died when their private car crashed after its tyre burst.

In another accident, 15 people died and 11 other were seriously injured when three vehicles collided on the Kaplong-Kericho highway in Bomet County. A personal car was attempting to overtake a 14-seater matatu when it collided with an oncoming truck, leading to a three-vehicle smash up.

Two people died when the driver of their pickup lost control and plunged into River Nyamindi at the Kaboro bridge in Kirinyaga County. A further 13 people were injured when a Tahmeed bus developed mechanical problems and rammed into a matatu at the Kibarani flyover in Mombasa. Thankfully, there were no fatalities.

All these in just 10 days!

Only major accidents make media headlines. Many “smaller”ones are never reported.

Road carnage in Kenya is now a crisis! This is despite the fact that there’s a dedicated organisation with the requisite personnel, budget, and backed by a statute, that was formed solely for enhancing road safety. This is the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA). Despite operating for a decade now, accident fatalities rise every year.

It can no longer be sugarcoated, the NTSA is a complete failure. It needs to be disbanded immediately. Kenya needs to go back to the drawing board and develop a fresh approach to road safety.

Every Kenyan by now knows the causes of road carnage by rote. Speeding, drunken driving, unroadworthy vehicles, fatigued PSV drivers, reckless driving – complete impunity on the roads. Nobody cares.

What Kenya needs is a road safety tsar – a champion of the roads who is recruited competitively, and given a broad range of powers to deal with road carnage. Given the severity of this crisis, the road safety tsar should be positioned at the level of the constitutional offices (Auditor General, Attorney General), complete with security of tenure. The tsar should not report to or be directed by any other authority.

The NTSA should be transformed into a fit-for-purpose organisation, unlike the current unwieldy bureaucracy it has become. Relieve it of all clerical tasks like logbooks transfers. Move these to an agency in the Ministry of Transport. The office of the road safety tsar should focus exclusively on road safety. These clerical tasks are a major distraction from the road safety mandate that was the dominant concern when NTSA was formed.

The new office must reflect a complete change in mindset and approach. The current arrangements are soaked in sheer incompetence and corruption. The appointment of a new NTSA chairman, former Lunga Lunga MP Khatib Mwashetani, will change nothing. This is the same old discredited formbook where presidents appoint their political friends to critical positions as favours.

It has been proven that a strong-willed character with focus can end road carnage. Former Transport minister John Michuki did very well with the same thoroughly corrupt traffic police, a completely indisciplined matatu sector, and drunk drivers of personal vehicles. There was no NTSA.

Only a road safety tsar, appointed under given structures, stands a chance of replicating the Michuki performance. All other ministers of Transport and NTSA chiefs have been too cowardly!

The Easter holidays begin this week. Traditionally, this is one of the country’s peaks for road carnage. The NTSA will, as sure as night follows day, come out to ‘warn’ Kenyans against recklessness on the roads, and follow that up with a “harsh” rebuke to drivers when fatal accidents invariably occur.

This cycle must be broken. The very first step is to disband the NTSA immediately. Then bring in a road safety tsar under arrangements that give him or her real teeth to act.

— gathukara@gmail.com