Defiant Matatus vow to stay put as City Hall directs matatus to vacate CBD in 10 days

NAIROBI, KENYA: Matatu owners have vowed to defy a move by the County Government to ban them from operating in the CBD in the next ten days.

City Hall on Wednesday directed that all Matatu operators should vacate the Central Business District by next week in a move to decongest the capital.

The newly introduced 24 National Youth Service (NYS) buses are scheduled to take over operations in the CBD.

Matatu Owners Association (M.O.A) chairman, Simon Kimutai on Thursday expressed his displeasure with the directive saying that he was not aware of any such notice from the County Government.

“You just don’t move and say matatus are going to go out of town, to where? You must agree and plan with the stakeholders involved to get solutions,” exclaimed Kimutai.

He was further opposed to the proposal that matatus should operate from the previously gazetted 9 termini that were now under the control of the County Government, saying they lacked the capacity to accommodate the over 20,000 matatus in operating in Nairobi.

“If the County government wants to do it alone then it’s going to be a problem. We also need to know whether the move is expected to affect all transport service providers or only limited to matatus,” observed Kimutai.

County Transport CEC, Mohammed Dagane had directed that Matatus use designated terminals to drop-off passengers.