Public transport operators tempering with speed limiting devices-govt

Some unscrupulous bus operators are tempering with installed speed limiting devices with drivers also travelling above the mandatory speed limit while carrying passengers, an official has said.

According to Statutory Instrument (SI) 118 of 2023, all public service vehicles must be fitted with speed limiting devices which work to limit the vehicle’s speed to 100 km per hour or less. The devices must be certified by a vehicle inspecting officer.

Permanent secretary for the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructural Development Joy Makumbe told the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Public Accounts that some operators were removing the gadgets.

“From three or four instances that we have monitored where we have seen some anomalies, we have noted that some unscrupulous bus operators or drivers, they just fit these gadgets for compliance purposes to obtain a certificate of fitness at VID (Vehicle Inspection Depratment).

Once they get a certificate of fitness, either they remove the gadgets or they just return with the gadgets. And we have since proved that,” she said.

“I think the recent one was the bus which was captured by Youth Empowerment Minister Tino Machakaire on camera. When the bus was impounded by VID, they noticed that the gadget was temporary.

According to the S.I, temporarily removing the gadgets is a crime liable to a level five fine or imprisonment or both. So action is taken.” Makumbe however said at the moment, there is no capacity for electronic monitoring of the speed limiting devices.

“What we are also now trying to do is a deterrent measure for issues that are within our safety. “For us to be able to do enforcement of these speed limiting gadgets and ensuring that there is compliance, we need our enforcement authorities on the roads, primarily in this case, to be able to have gadgets, either mobile gadgets, so that they will be able to extract information from the bus which would have been speeding,” she said.

Zimbabwe has recently witnessed an increase in the number of buses being involved in fatal accidents on highways, an indication that they will be traveling above the mandatory speed of 100 km per hour.

New Ziana