Kenyan matatu drivers! I think the sentence in itself is self explanatory. It tells a lot that the sentence e ends with an exclamation mark and not a full stop. It is a mixture of shock, anger, derision and contempt.

You ask why? Let me tell you. Kenya is a very beautiful country, famed for a lot of things. Exotic wildlife and pristine beaches, athletics and rugby have all managed to put Kenya on the world map. Kenya is the strongest country financially in East Africa and is said to be the gateway to Eastern Africa, thanks to the port of Mombasa and the soon to be completed port of Lamu.

But that’s not what I want to talk about. There is something else that makes Kenya unique, makes it stand out. This is the fourteen seater passenger vehicles, commonly used to ferry passengers back and forth to and from various destinations. A vehicle is run by a driver and a tout, whereby the driver’s job is to drive and pick n drop passengers while the tout’s job is to gather fare from the passengers as well as look for more passengers.

A fourteen seater mini van is commonly referred to as a matatu or simply a mat. It goes without saying that matatu drivers take the cake for being the most rude and arrogant as well as manner less people to ever walk on this planet.

Let’s start with their driving expertise. Most drivers learn it informally, starting as touts and taking over the wheel from their more experienced colleagues on road stretches that are not manned by the police. They take several months to learn and needless to say, since they learn all the tricks and maneuvers from their vehicle drivers’, they take up all the bad, weird and crazy driving styles that are synonymous to Kenyan roads. This conductor then proceeds to a driving school and gets a driving license in a record one week.

If you watch any Kenyan road closely, you will realize that no one obeys the traffic rules, traffic lights are simply there for decoration, For instance, you will find a normal driver waiting for the light to turn before continuing to drive. This on e in a million driver waits patiently and every car behind her is forced to get in line whether they want it or not. If this road is one way and there are two lanes, any matatu driver worth his salt will try every trick possible to get into the next line and zoom by everyone in the fastest sped possible.

But that is not the only bad habit matatu drivers have. They also overlap a lot. It is very common to find a line of cars held up in traffic jam, bumper to bumper. Suppose this is a two way road. Then along comes this matatu driver and since he is in a hurry, he gets on the other lane and zooms on, until he meets oncoming traffic whereby he starts nosing the line patiently waiting for the jam to end, all the while looking for an entrance point. Of course everyone knows its wrong but no one will complain because the police do nothing anyway.

Over speeding is another bad habit of Kenyan drivers which I wont belabor because enough about has been written. As is playing loud offensive music, overtaking at corners and generally breaking every traffic law in the country. Never the less, I must point out that these are the best drivers for emergency services like ambulances or fire fighters since they know very well how to weave through traffic and drive at top speeds. Ever cloud has its silver lining….