EDITORIAL COMMENT: It’s time to end the kombi menace The late Jocelyn Gomba
The late Jocelyn Gomba

The late Jocelyn Gomba

A month hardly passes without gory incidents where innocent pedestrians on the streets of Harare, some of them walking on pavements, are overrun by kombis.

These incidents happen while the drivers claim to be either fleeing Zimbabwe Republic Police, municipal or Vehicle Inspection Department officers or are driving against the flow of traffic.

Harare is now a jungle where lawlessness has become the order of the day as kombi and taxi drivers break traffic rules and regulations with impunity. Nothing happens to them.

A Harare man, Mr Adwell Mabanga and a Girls High Form Four pupil Jocelyn Gomba were killed on Monday after they were overrun by a kombi being driven by a youthful driver, who apparently was driving behind them against the flow of traffic.

Yes, this is among the many such accidents in which innocent pedestrians are killed by kombi crews and in some cases it emerges later the people behind the wheel are conductors experimenting with passengers’ lives.

What is clear is the current ZRP and Harare Municipal police’s strategies of enforcing traffic rules and regulations have dismally failed and there is need for the two forces to go back to the drawing board and map out new strategies.

All corners of our major roads in the city have become illegal pick up points for kombis and when these people see police officers approaching, they take off at high speed.

There are many cases where passengers have fallen off steps of such kombis and died.

We also propose that stiffer penalties, including deterrent fines and prison terms, be imposed on kombi drivers and other motorists who violate traffic regulations.

Kombi proprietors who employ underage and inexperienced drivers should also be charged and, if necessary, have their operating permits withdrawn.

Municipal and ZRP officers should be deployed daily to deal with kombi and taxi operators who use undesignated pick-up points such as the one at Girls High School that have become a danger as they disrupt the flow of human and vehicular traffic. Harare City should also give its traffic regulators all legal and financial support so that those kombi owners caught on the wrong side of the law do not rush to court alleging violation of their rights.

The chaotic situation in the city that is superintended by opposition MDC-T councillors calls for a total overhaul of the systems including removal of inept officials from council.

Government should consider the idea of phasing out smaller kombis and replace them with 30-seater buses. The current public transport model is not safe and affordable to commuters.

Some municipalities in the world run viable, safe and efficient public transport system through public private partnerships and it baffles one’s mind why Harare City is failing to adopt this when councillors make so much noise about achieving world class city status for Harare by 2030.

We also do not understand why other parastatals in the transport sector such as Zupco and National Railways of Zimbabwe have failed to take advantage of the current chaotic public transport system to relaunch themselves.

The lawlessness in Harare needs a holistic approach that brings together all stakeholders such as Harare Municipality, Government, police, VID, residents, transport operators and non-governmental organisations to hammer a solution and stop this wanton killing of innocent people by these lunatic kombi drivers.

Incidentally, the unfortunate death of two pedestrians in Harare came only a few days after Home Affairs Minister Dr Ignatius Chombo announced plans to get rid of the little killing machines on our streets. The latest killings should convince the most die-hard opponents of tougher measures against kombis and mushikashika operators that the time has come to end the chaos in the Harare CBD.

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