'Kombis must register with associations'

GOVERNMENT is working on a legislation to ensure that all commuter operators are registered with an association and operators permits would be issued to only those affiliated to an association.

Transport and Infrastructure Development Minister, engineer Joel Biggie Matiza said the development was aimed at ensuring there is adherence to road rules and accountability from the transport operators.

He was speaking in Parliament last Wednesday.

Drawing examples from the Bulawayo commuter omnibus system which has associations, Minister Matiza said the haphazard issuance of permits to commuter bus operators had led to increased accidents in the country.

"We also face challenges on permits issued out to commuter bus operators. These appear to be too many compared to the number of people commuting. There is as a result competition among the commuter bus operators and hence accidents are increasing.

"There are many other factors contributing to this problem and we need associations that have to be formed by these operators so that they self manage," said eng Matiza. He said the formation of associations was part of measures to bring sanity on the country's roads.

"Without associations, we are going to continuously have these problems and we are going to take serious measures to ensure that commuter operators cannot get a permit from the Ministry without being a member of an association. That measure will ensure that people adhere to the road traffic rules," he said.

"You will find that in other regions like Bulawayo, there are associations and these associations have assisted in curbing road carnage. We are taking a number of measures to further reduce road carnage and that includes post accident measures.

Eng Matiza said the Government was working on the Road Accident Fund to ensure that it always has sufficient funds to assist road accident victims such as the injured.

"Those should get emergency support such as being ferried to the hospitals on time. We are working with the Ministry of Health and Child Care on that note to ensure that we have specialist medical doctors in various fields so that we are able to manage that in all emergency phases," he said.

He also said his Ministry has plans to legally empower the Traffic Safety Council of Zimbabwe to impound unroadworthy vehicles.

"We have the Zimbabwe Traffic Safety Council that looks at the issues of road safety. The Traffic Safety Board exists but it does not have the authority compared to authority that the Vehicle Inspection Department (VID) has. With the VID, if your vehicle is found to be unroadworthy, they are legally empowered to impound it yet the Traffic Safety Council lacks the authority to do that," said eng Matiza.

"What we want to do is to come back to this Parliament so that we amend existing laws and empower the Traffic Safety Council to have teeth to enforce its authority".