Assessing progress with the implementation of the public transport policy in Kenya

Abstract

Paper presented at the 31st Annual Southern African Transport Conference 9-12 July 2012 "Getting Southern Africa to Work", CSIR International Convention Centre, Pretoria, South Africa.The public transport system in Kenya is basically provided by privately owned matatu vehicles whose ownership structure is atomised. They initially entered as pirates running parallel to the then subsidised public transport system, were resisted but eventually allowed to operate through a Presidential decree but without formal regulatory provisions to govern their operations. Since then, several policy formulations have been proposed and implemented in attempts to organise the sector without much success. Using both primary and secondary data, the paper gives a chronology of the implementation of key policy formulations meant to streamline the sector. Also, using part of the information generated from a bigger study which used case studies of fifteen matatu businesses on selected routes in Nairobi, the study evaluates the progress with the implementation of the public policy in Kenya with specific reference to the latest policy directive. The paper concludes that the cost, mode and time implications should be taken into consideration in the implementation of such key policies.