Regulate private bus services

The sudden private bus strike which affected main routes in and around Colombo, left thousands of commuters stranded yesterday. This strike was, according to private bus unions, due to a dispute between a private bus driver and inspectors of the Western Province Transport Authority (WPTA).

These strikes are a common occurrence. The private bus operators have earned notoriety over the years for going on strike at the drop of a hat causing much inconvenience to the public and damage to the country’s economy in terms of the number of man hours lost. Often what sparks off such strikes is an assault by a policeman of an errant driver following a heated argument. What intrigues one is why such isolated incidents are often made use of by these bus operators to flex their muscles without taking recourse to the law of the land.

Ironically these drivers and conductors who have taken up cudgels so vehemently for their rights which they claim have been violated by the WPTA officials are themselves notorious for gross violation of the rights of commuters and the law. Overloaded buses idling at bus halts for more people to get in is a common sight on busy roads. Angry commuters on board being delayed give expression to their anger only to be ordered out of the bus by haughty conductors or drivers. As such people have to suffer untold miseries for hours suffer in chock a block buses to travel even a short distance. Most of these buses are not roadworthy and remain the main contributory factor for traffic congestion and pollution in the city and suburbs.

Overtaking most of these buses is a task only an equally reckless motorist can perform. These buses are also a nuisance in that they are most of the time stopped on two way roads parallel to one another so as to prevent other buses overtaking them causing long line of traffic to form behind them.

The police often fail to take action against these errant drivers. It is alleged that the palms of either traffic cops on road or their superiors are regularly greased by bus owners. This failure is also due to the fact that among these bus owners there are powerful politicians and even police officers.

These private buses on the other hand do not render the service expected of them. They are yet another business bent on exploiting the public. If they are a service that they claim to be, why on earth are there no private buses on roads after 9.00 p. m.?

But for the few remaining fleets of peoplised bus depots that have survived the restructuring of the state public transport sector, the public would have been left with no fall back position as was evident yesterday. Those who would have looked forward to an improvement in public transport must now be disillusioned. The harum-scarum behaviour of the private bus owners and their crew members reminds one of the ugly CTB days under the UF coalition, which called for the introduction of private buses. Isn’t it unfortunate that the country has returned where it started off seeking a change twenty long years ago? This is a bitter lesson that the policy makers have to learn from the intransigence of private bus owners, who are now in a position to dictate terms to the government by holding the people to ransom.

This points to the urgent need for the state to adopt an effective mechanism to regulate the private buses. The situation is already going out of control and people are at their mercy. Unless steps are taken urgently rid the public transport sector of unwanted disruptions of this nature, they day will not be far off when those given to wildcat strikes will emerge strong enough to paralyse the entire sector much to the detriment of the country’s economy and the public interest.