Government plans to automate the processes of issuing driving licenses
The process will cover enrolment, training and driving test for applicants
Magara Darious the managing Editor of Eastafricanwatch.net interviewed Benon Kajuna a director of Transport in the Ministry of Works and Transport, below are the details;
- What are some of the achievements you have made over the years in the directorate of Transport in the ministry of works?
Response
There are quite a number of achievements the Directorate of Transport has achieved over the years aimed at improving the road safety situationin the country.
- The Traffic and Road Act 1998 was amended in 2020 to provide for: strengthening road transport regulation and road safety management, to empower the Minister to Organise public transport, to provide for conditions of market entry, oversight and exit in public transport services, and to provide for issuance of Professional Driving Permit for drivers of Commercial Drivers, among others.
- The Directorate of Transport has finalized the Regulations to operationalize the above provisions in the amended law; and forwarded them to Attorney General for clearance before publication in the Gazette.
- In October this year 2022, The Hon. Minister of Works and Transport launched the National Road Safety Action 2021/22 – 2025/26 with the overall target of reducing road crash fatalities and serious injuries by 25% by the year 2026. The Plan provides for intentional set of actions with it’s monitoring framework to be implemented in a period of 5 years.
- The Directorate has automated the licensing processes for commercial vehicles both passengers and cargo to improve regulation of public transport. This process commenced with passenger commercial vehicles and will be rolled out to also licence goods vehicles. The function of registration of motor vehicle was reverted back to the mother Ministry (MoWT). We are in the transition phase and once the motor vehicle registration system is in place, this function will be fully implemented by the Ministry. Implementation of motor vehicle registration function will definitely enhance regulation and licensing off motor vehicles and as such lead to improvement in road safety.
- The Directorate has enhanced the process of issuing a Driving Licence and the features of the Driving Licences making it very difficult to forge. This implies only those eligible are ones with the Driving Licence. The Driving Licence meets ISO standards and recently won a Global Award as the best Identification Document.
- We were able to ratify the UN Conventions and Agreements on Road Traffic and Road Safety including the African Road Safety Charter. This further affirms to Uganda’s commitment at the international scene to improve road safety and to also adopt international standards. We also stand to benefit from a number of road safety programmes by the UN having ratified the Instruments.
- The Directorate has put in place a framework for more advocacy work on road safety by mobilising and coordinating the work of Civil Society Organisations especially in the Five Risk Factors namely: Helmet Use, Seat Belt Use, Child Restraint, Speeding and Drink Driving.
- What big challenges are you facing which affect the transport and road safety sector in the ministry?
Response
- Behavioural and Attitudinal Challenges: Behaviouraland Attitudinal challenges are some of our problematic issues facing road safety in Uganda. We are seeing so much indiscipline, disregard of traffic rules, lack of respect to traffic signs and signals,recklessness, speeding, road rage and all related human related factors one can think of. There are road user groups synonymous to this kind of behaviour such as riders of boda bodas, drivers of 14 seat PSVs mini buses and the younger drivers (particularly the so-called Subaru drivers). This is compounded by the poor road safety culture in our country. This situation must be reversed. We are aware how these human factors contribute to more than 80% of the fatal and serious road crashes in the country. We must change and influence people’s perceptions towards road safety.
·        Financial and Investment Challenges: The resource envelope and the so many competing sectors or programmes make it sometimes complicated to prioritise road safety. The demand for paved network, road rehabilitation and maintenance among others is still huge that road safety continues to receive paltry financial allocations.
We are also yet to see private sector investing more in road safety. Attempts for PPPs in road safety such as mandatory motor vehicle inspections services have also had their fair share of challenges.
Funding for road safety education and awareness is not well appreciated as much as it is for disease control and prevention, whereas road crashes are posing a major health challenge.
It is estimated by WHO that Low income and developing countries such as Uganda lose the equivalent of upto 5% of their GDP to road crashes that translates to UX 7.4 Trillion for the FY 2020/21. This loss is so huge for an economy like Uganda to bear when an investment in road safety of about UGX 21Billion annually would reverse this situation.
- Slow Implementation: There has been a slow implementation as a result of low financing and investment in road safety interventions. If Uganda is to achieve the target set out in the National Road Safety Action Plan and the Global Decade of Action to reduce road crash fatalities and Seriously injuries by 25% by the 2026 and by 50% by 2030 respectively, there is need to invest more and fast track implementation of key road safety interventions.
- Research in road safety and road crash data management: Effective road safety interventions should be evidence based. Road Safety research is still low in Uganda. Equally so is inadequate road safety data management.
- Issue of Standards: We are seeing many counterfeit products on the markets that have a major effect to road safety. Car spare parts, car service parts, motor cycle helmets are some of the part on the market that do not meet standards.
- Advocacy:There has been growing interest in road safety advocacy in the last three years in Uganda. However, this is still low to have full impact and influence.
- Physical and Land use planning: The current physical and land use practices are having a major effect on the safety star rating of our road network. The practices encourage linearsettlement along the upgraded roads. The fastgrowing settlementsalong the highways are generatinga lot of circulatory and pedestriantraffic, exposing them to a risk ofcrashes. The settlement ideally would require several safe crossing points, NMT facilities and bus stops which in most cases are inadequate.
- Organised Mass Transit Transport System:The lack of a well organised mass transit and multi modal transport system has led to un reliable public transport characterised mainly by 14 -seater mini buses and boda-bodas particularly in the urban centres posing a major road safety challenge.
- Some senior drivers say that most road accidents in Uganda are caused by inexperienced drivers who it is suspected get driving licenses inappropriately. This means they get driving licenses when they have not been subjected to the road driving test. What is your comment on the driving license issues?
Response
- The law requires that a Learner driver enrols in a licensed driving school, and then applies for learner driving licence. The learner driver undertakes training at a licensed driving school within three months which is the validity period of Learner Driving Licence. Upon successfully completing training and acquiring the skills and knowledge to drive, the Learner Driver is issued with a certificate of completion. Then after a Driving Test is arranged currently at the IOV offices of the Uganda Police. Upon passing the test the Learner driver is issued with a certificate of competence which qualifies him or her to be issued with Driving Licence of the category trained for. All these process with the exception of the issuing process of the Driving Licence are manual and susceptible to subjectivity and abuse.
- However, there are plans to automate all these processes right from enrolment, training and driving test, which will go along to ensure that drivers are competent enough to qualify for a Driving Licence.
- There are also plans to review the training curriculum and manuals for drivers.
- That most vehicles which are on the road do not get mandatory checks and periodic repair which make it easy for them to break(road un worthy) while on the road and cause accidents. Is this true and how can it be addressed?
Response
- It is true that most vehicle on the road do not get mandatory checks. The Ministry in 2015 outsourced the function of mandatory motor vehicle inspections from a Swiss firm called SGS which set up 7 inspection centres across the country. However, there were challenges in implementation of this contract and enforcing compliance that led to suspension of service by SGS. Government has now concluded negotiations with SGS on the resumption of mandatory motor vehicle inspection services. Once an agreed position is approved by Government, mandatory motor vehicle inspections will resume and this will require commercial vehicles to be inspected once a year while other vehicles once every after two years.
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- BodaBodas cause accidents especially most riders who are young and careless and inexperienced. What specific plan do you and the department of road safety have on BodaBoda riders and the menace they have become?
Response
- Boda boda operations in urban centres have thrived due to the void of lack of a mass transit system for public transport. They are filling this gap as Government strives to put in place a Mass Transit System. However, the challenges that you have mentioned of inexperience and careless have had a major negative effect to boda boda operations and road safety. Boda boda operations have also been infiltrated by criminals.
 Government is committed to organising this industry and ensure it is safe and secure.The initiatives being undertaken are:
- Registration and profiling of riders
- Carrying out mass training of riders
- Assisting riders to acquire the statutory requirements to operate
- Designate Stages for boda boda operations
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This will start with Kampala Capital City as a pilot and will be reciprocated to other parts of the country
 6 Are traffic police officers doing enough to reduce accidents? What more could be done to help especially to reduce corruption in this work by the traffic police officers being bribed by drivers.
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Response
- The Traffic Police are doing so much within their means to enforce traffic laws and regulations, including management of traffic. We applaud them for the good work their doing. However, The Traffic Police is also constrained and lacks adequate human resources, enforcement tools; equipment and facilitation for them to carry out their mandate effectively. The Traffic Police cannot also be everywhere and at all times. We are seeing CCTV cameras complementing the efforts of the physical Traffic Officers on the road.
- There are procedures within the Police Force to deal with corrupt officers.
- Some senior drivers say that our roads are poor as in they may not have tarmac and also be rough but that again they are narrow. What is being done to improve on our roads to reduce accidents?
Response
- As earlier mentioned there are many competing priorities for resources. We all know that the roads sub-sector takes the lions share of these resources. Government has invested heavily to improve the road network although there is so much to be done especially in urban centres.
- We have also seen a trend where improvement in road network has led to more speeds, reckless behaviour resulting in road crashes. Government is however committed to building resilient and safe road infrastructure through more:
- More Non-motorised facilities
- Installation of Furniture and prevention of vandalism of road furniture
- Capacity improvements including construction of Expressways
- Signalling junctions
- Improved traffic management
- Carrying out road safety audits and road safety inspections
- Some roads users especially pedestrians do not know how to move and walk on the roads. What are you planning in order to create more awareness among the public?
Response
- The Ministry together with the key partners KCCA, UNRA and Uganda Police step road safety education and awareness. We have a number of Civil Society Organisations who have joined Government MDAs to support awareness of the general pubic particularly pedestrians. The Hon. Minister of Works and Transport has also issued an appeal to the Private Sector Organisations as part of their social corporate responsibility to support the awareness programmes across the country.
 9 Do you have issues with funding and  how much funds would you need next year to make road safety come true or happen in Uganda?
Response
- We definitely have issues of funding mainly due to the so many competing priorities from all sectors.UGX 21Billion is needed Next FY to make road safety come true. However, to have an impact this funding has to be sustained for a period of time.
- What are your future plans for the road safety sector or directorate in the ministry?
Response
- The future plans of the Directorate are:
- Establishment of the Automated Driver Training and Tests System
- Building capacity in road safety
- Operationalisation a Road Crash Database system
- Increase targeted road safety sensitization and awareness
- Operationalise Mandatory motor vehicle inspection services
- Strengthen regulation and licensing of public transport
- Ensure improved coordination of road safety activities and interventions
- Strengthen Road Safety Research
- Update Traffic and Road Safety Regulations and Standards
 The above are some of the key interventions that the Directorate will implement in future, however the goal is to ensure full implementations of actions as outline in the National Road Safety Action Plan 2021/22—2025/26
