Police now lose driver tests role to NTSA in law changes

Police have lost the powers to conduct driver tests after President Uhuru Kenyatta approved a law change that transferred the role to the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA).

President Kenyatta approved the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Amendment) Bill, 2018 that amended the Traffic Act.

The new law offers backing to the NTSA after it faced legal suits from driving schools opposed to its earlier attempts to shut down driver examination facilities under the Kenya Police and moved all driving test operations to its motor vehicle inspection centres.

The schools say the NTSA was relying on a law that was not subjected to public scrutiny, a position that has been cured by the change to the Traffic Act.

“Delete the words 'driving test examiners' and substitute therefore the words with 'the Authority',” reads the amendment. Driver testing was a function of the police prior to the setting up of the NTSA in 2012.

One has to master traffic signs and rules which comprise the theory and pass the practicals before they qualify for a licence.

The NTSA in 2017 shut down driver examination facilities in Karen, Jogoo Road and Ruaraka run by the police and transferred the role to the authority, sparking a war with the Kenya Driving Schools Association.

The driving schools in their petition to the High Court cited lack of consultation, arguing the NTSA’s Likoni Road facility is too small to handle the tests and that it does not have adequate driving sites.

The NTSA has moved to curb escalating road carnage after a survey established that more than 90 per cent of accidents are due to human error. in Kenya, a driving course lasts an average one month.

Part of the agency's effort in restoring sanity on the roads was a review of the driving school curriculum last year, which now include several modules and is designed to address the different needs of drivers depending on vehicles used.