Activist okiya Omtatah has filed a suit against the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) and the Transport ministry seeking the suspension of the new curriculum for training and testing of drivers.
In the suit which was filed on Monday, Omtatah seeks to stop the implementation of the traffic (Diving schools and Instructors) Rules 207. He says that the rules which involve mandatory vetting of all driving schools and public service vehicle operators by an interagency taskforce are based on the traffic rules which are not yet gazette.
“In the circumstances and unless court interdicts NTSA’s intended vetting, driving schools and and PSV operators will lose their licences,” says Omtatah.
He also points out that the rules are against public interest and cannot be implemented by most schools because of the new demands imposed on them without effective public participation.
Under the rules, each driving school should own not less than 1.7 acres of land on which to develop facilities. Among the infrastructure there should be a model of highway, well equipped classrooms with computers as well as projectors and a management structure.
Otatah also accuses NTSA of arbitrarily disabling e-citizen passwords of the driving schools as well as police examiners on its portal since last December.