A major traffic snarl-up has been witnessed in parts of Nairobi’s CBD and the Thika Super Highway road following a standoff involving motorists and hawkers.
The impasse was witnessed after a section of PSV operators working along Thika Road moved to lock out hawkers by blocking sections of the road at Globe Roundabout, the matatu stage near Koja Mosque, Moi Avenue, and Tom Mboya.
They are protesting the county government’s decision to allocate their operating stages to hawkers.
The situation threatened to turn violent with the section of the matatu operators resorting to destroying wares paraded along the roads as witnessed in some of the footages seen by k24 digital.
The scramble over the limited spaces and conflict between the two groups has been brewing since January when the county government effected the ban on hawking merchandise in parts of the city.
The directive, aimed at further decongesting the city, allowed hawkers to sell their wares along the backstreet of Tom Mboya to Kirinyanga road with hawking of merchandise in backstreets and lanes limited from 4 pm to 10 PM between Monday and Saturday.
Speaking over the impasse, Simon Mburu, a matatu operator plying the babadogo route, decried the move by hawkers to invade their spaces.
“Today we woke up and found our spaces taken over by hawkers. They were here by 3 Am and have earmarked almost the whole area including the terminals where we have rightfully been assigned to. They claim to have letters from the county sanctioning their actions. The problem is we have not been told to move, so we have decided to let the standoff continue,” Mburu said.
“It is unfortunate that politicians have made a point of engaging the matatu sectors, hawkers and bodaboda sectors only when looking for votes. Once they are done they turn against us and start disrupting our business. this is very wrong. Mr Sakaja should know we will be paying the dues owed to the county at the end of the month. We also have families to feed and we cannot do that in such an environment” matatu’s owner association official, Kushen Muchiri decried.
The disruptions of activities in major roads and towns have become a common spectacle in the city and its environs as protesters seek to air their grievances.
Three days ago on Monday, January, 27, 2025, Thika road was rendered impassable for hours as Kenyatta University students protested over a power blackout in one of the hostels.
The students took to the streets to decry the power outage they claimed had lasted for more than two weeks.
