Inside bus owners’ petition

Bus operators under their umbrella Uganda Bus Owners Association (Uboa) yesterday formally petitioned the Ministry of Local Government over park user fees ahead of today’s meeting with different government officials.

According to the Statutory Instrument by the Ministry of Local Government, Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) is mandated to charge every individual operating a medium omnibus Shs2.4m per year. 

The operators are also required to pay an annual government licence fee of Shs2.84m per bus, which comprises Shs1.5m for Passengers Service Vehicle and Shs1.34m as Advance Income Tax to Uganda Revenue Authority. However, Uboa members said this money is too much compared to the operation costs.

In a nine-page document dated August 28, signed by Uboa chairman Solomon Nsiimire, bus owners want the government to permanently halt the implementation of the annual park user fees of Shs2.4m per bus.

The association secretary, Mr Robert Mutebi, said this is on ground that the current economic conditions cannot enable them to pay this fee.

“We are aware that this had been agreed upon by the various stakeholders to replace the multiple park charges but the current economic conditions cannot enable us to pay this fee,” he said. 

According to the petition, they also want the government to set up bus terminals to be managed by Uboa to reduce the high loading and offloading fees paid to private bus terminal owners.
Uboa pays Shs53,000 for loading from privately-owned terminals for each bus and pays the same amount when offloading. They argue that this is enough to cater for the park user fees.

They also want the fees and taxes charged on buses streamlined with a view of enabling the industry to provide affordable services to the people.

According to Uboa, the current charges are many and high and they want them to be consolidated into one affordable fee.

“We pray that all the taxes/levies for acquiring a licence should be combined in a total fee of Shs1.84m per bus per year, including Advance Income Tax of Shs1,340,000 and Shs500,000 for all other levies,” reads in part the petition.

Bus owners also want the routing of PSV’s licence to be streamlined to level the ground for all players and protect bus owners on long routes, in addition to reducing the taxation of import duty on buses.

The petition has been copied to other ministers, inlcuding Internal Affairs; Trade, Industry and Cooperatives; KCCA and Metropolitan Affairs; State for Transport; commissioner general of Uganda Revenue Authority; executive director of Kampala Capital City Authority; and commissioner of Transport Regulation and Safety.

On Tuesday last week, bus owners withdrew all buses from routes in protest against KCCA deployment that resulted in locking up all bus terminals, accusing bus owners of defaulting on payment of the said Shs2.4m as park user fees.

This promoted government intervention with a mini briefing that resulted in the temporary suspension of the strike on Friday pending the formal submission of the petition, highlighting specific issues they want the government to address.

In the same petition, cross-border bus operators with foreign registered number plates, also protested the same park user fees. These included Simba Cool East Africa Limited, Volcano Limited, Trinity Express and SR Classic Coach Company Limited.

Petition details 

According to the petition, cross-border bus operators pay commercial road user fees at every border they cross per bus, which fluctuates with the dollar rate. 

The petition indicates that the road user fee is paid in addition to the annual PSV fees of Shs1.5m and Advanced Income Tax of Shs940,000, Trading Licence of Shs512,000, in addition to garbage collection fees, which is between Shs1.2m and Shs2.4m per year to KCCA.

They claim that the new additional Shs2.4m per year is disproportionately charged on all bus operators without consideration of the peculiar operations of cross-border bus operators, since they don’t pick any passengers from municipalities and towns in Uganda but only transit from the point of departure to Kampala.

They said the tax is not only unfair but also extortionate and amounts to double taxation. They, therefore, recommend that the government should review or facilitate a review of double taxation on cross-border bus operators in Uganda.