By Patrick Beja
Fuel siphoning by trucks crew has become a lucrative business along the Kenyan highways.
Rogue drivers and turn boys make a kill as they steal from their employers by drawing diesel from the trucks and selling it to fuel dealers along the highways.
Fuel siphoning along the Mombasa-Nairobi highway is a common thing. This tanker is parked to give the dealers time to steal diesel, the dangers not withstanding. |
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From Mombasa to Malaba border point, it is common to spot men with clothes drenched in oil who are involved in fuel siphoning.Scenes of oil siphoning and sale are common around Mariakani weighbridge in Coast Province.
It is estimated that the 12,000 transit trucks that deliver cargo to the Great Lakes region from Mombasa Port every week lose about 100 litres of diesel each on a one way trip and a similar amount on the return journey.
Trucks stop by the roadside during the day and fuel is emptied into drums and loaded on waiting vans and pick-ups for transportation to vendors.
Elsewhere on the highway, groups of people wave down motorists displaying half-cut plastic drums to send a signal that fuel is on sale. Kwale OCPD Mr Nelson Okioga says transporters should spearhead a public safety campaign on careless handling of fuel along the highway.
The executive officer of the Kenya Transport Association, Coast branch, Ms Eunice Mwanyallo says the truck crew pocket about Sh168 million a week from the sale of stolen fuel in the 12,000 transit trucks deployed along the Northern Corridor.
Siphoned fuel is loaded into a canter for sale. Photo/Maarufu Mohamed/Standard |
She notes that fuel siphoning exposes truck crew and their customers to the danger of fire since some of them are habitual smokers and they store it in unsafe structures.
A time bomb
"Fuel siphoning is a danger in waiting. Sometimes up to five trucks or tankers stop at the same place where fuel is carted away," says Mwanyallo.
Kenya Transport Association (KTA) acting Coast chairman, Mr Kiprop Bundotich says several transporters have now been forced to use high technology instruments to monitor the movement of their trucks while on the road and also check their fuel consumption.
He says they are using such instruments as Global Positioning System (GPS) and computers for analysing data on distance and the fuel consumed. The devices fitted on the trucks are being procured locally and from South Africa.
Mr Paul Maiyo, a transport manager at Siginon Freight Limited, confirms his company has been buying these computerised gadgets to monitor fuel consumption. He says the technology has helped check siphoning of diesel from trucks in the past two years.
One set of the gadget to monitor engine fuel consumption costs Sh80,000 while the computer to analyse data goes for Sh320,000, he says. "We buy the devices in large numbers. They have been vital in curbing the loss of fuel from our trucks," Maiyo explains.
But the transporters say truck drivers have found ways of cheating them even with the use of these devices. They say the drivers often drive without engaging gears to save fuel.
Bundotich, who is also the group executive director at Buzeki Enterprises Limited, says this damages gearboxes and is a major cause of accidents as drivers easily lose control of the trucks.
Bundotich contends that the ill-gotten money from siphoned fuel has been a source of death for many drivers and turn boys.
The truck crew, he explains, use the proceeds on alcohol consumption and maintaining multiple partners along the highway making them vulnerable to accidents and HIV/Aids.
Bundotich says transporters are now networking and lobbying the Government in a bid to end the illegal trade along the highways.
Transporters are being encouraged to provide better working conditions to their crew including better pay to stem the vice, he says.
"Siphoning of fuel should be curbed so that we do not pass over extra costs to our suppliers and consumers," he adds.
The 300 transport firms under the umbrella of KTA have been unsuccessfully fighting fuel siphoning for many years.
Curbing the menace
Mwanyallo says they plan to introduce performance cards for drivers from this month so that those who do not siphon for a certain period of time get promotion to the grade of senior professional drivers. She says another measure would be for owners of transit trucks to provide Certificate of Good Conduct, driving licence, a copy of the national identity card to KTA so that the data is shared with police, Kenya Ports Authority and Kenya Revenue Authority. The agencies could track down drivers who siphon fuel or those involved in theft of cargo.
"We believe that keeping data for drivers and sharing information with various agencies will help reduce siphoning of fuel and theft of cargo along the highway," Mwanyallo says.
Transporters intend to use such data to weed out errant drivers from their employment.
The KTA members want to start implementing the measures with 25,000 transit trucks before turning to all the 50,000 trucks in the country.
At the Coast, siphoning of fuel is reported to be rampant between Mariakani weighbridge and Sultan Hamud areas.
KTA is seeking the backing of transport associations in the Great Lakes region so that foreign drivers collecting cargo in Kenya can be tracked down after committing an offence.
Mwanyallo says the new efforts will ensure that drivers sacked for engaging in fuel theft from the employer do not find employment elsewhere.
She explains that KTA was encouraging the Government to make it mandatory for transporters to be members of the association so as to enable effective gathering of data from all truck drivers.
