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{
    "id": 292868,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/292868/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 489,
    "type": "other",
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    "content": "stop and run away. I think a vehicle that is involved in an accident should be seized because that way, the owner of such vehicle will also have been penalised in that the vehicle will not be on the road. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, in China and elsewhere, when a Public Service Vehicle (PSV) driver, and especially a bus driver, causes an accident and it is found that the accident happened due to his fault, he is charged with causing death. I have seen some of them taken from the courtroom to an open ground and executed there and then because they caused the death of passengers. I am not saying that we should be executing some of these people but I am sure that if the penalty for causing death due to dangerous driving is severe enough, people will stop driving dangerously. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, my colleague talked about motorcycles and crash helmets. If you go to Rwanda and see a single motorcycle rider or passenger without a crash helmet, I will give them US$50. I have been to Rwanda about 20 times. I have not seen a single person riding on a motorcycle without putting on a crash helmet. It is a question of impunity in Kenya. Another issue that is not covered in this Bill, although it is in the Traffic Act and is covered by way of other regulations, which I also want covered in this Bill; is that of PSVs playing loud music and donning multiple colours. If such a vehicle causes an accident and runs away, you cannot identify it at all. You cannot say what colour it was. Public Service Vehicles also play loud music. Nowadays they even have television sets onboard. Playing of loud music in PSVs was stopped through the Michuki Rules, some of which I hope and pray that we will incorporate in this Bill. I also feel that it is important for vehicle registration numbers to be printed on the bodies of PSVs in very large sizes, because offending drivers keep on changing the number plates of their matatu, buses and lorries. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, it appears that one of the most paying jobs in the Police Service is that of a traffic police officer. I remember some police officers who came to me and said: “Please, mheshimiwa, can you have us transferred to the Traffic Department?” It seems to be a very well paying job. Therefore, we need to have some sort of rationale as to how somebody is transferred to the Traffic Department. Another issue I was hoping we could look at is that of having community traffic policing. I have seen vehicles that have committed traffic offences on KISS TV and other television stations. These media houses have cameras everywhere. They actually capture number plates of vehicles that commit traffic offences, but the Commissioner of Police does not do anything. Nobody else does anything. If we had community traffic police officers or designated responsible persons in place, and we put in place CCTV cameras, which can be sponsored to the police through public-private partnership, like the radio stations that have been sponsoring some of the CCTV footages, we can use such images to penalise traffic offenders. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, road licences were removed yet they were a very important way of identifying vehicles. I wonder what the benefit of removing road licences is. Now a 20-ton lorry uses the road on the same basis as a small car like Toyota"
}