When You Must Not Overtake — and the Pass-Left Exception

The full list. Any one of these being true means the answer is no:

• Where a "No Overtaking" sign is displayed
• Wherever there's a genuine risk of endangerment — the catch-all that overrides everything else here
• If someone behind is overtaking you, or clearly about to
• If you risk getting stuck in the opposing lane — say, a long queue ahead with nowhere safe to return to
• If you'd need to cross the centre line and there's oncoming traffic
• If you'd need to cross the centre line and visibility is limited
• Immediately before or on a pedestrian crossing not controlled by lights
• In conjunction with a junction where you have any obligation to give way — including priority-to-the-right — because your full attention belongs on the give-way situation, not on completing a pass

The exception that matters most in matatu traffic — read carefully.

If the vehicle ahead is indicating right — signalling a turn across your path — a normal right-side overtake is exactly wrong: that's the space it's about to occupy. But you are specifically permitted to pass on the left instead, because a vehicle turning right naturally moves toward the centre of the road, vacating the left portion of the lane.

This is precisely what happens when a matatu signals right into a junction. Forcing a full overtake into the opposing lane at that moment is genuinely dangerous — the vehicle is actively crossing your intended path. Easing past on the left as it commits to its turn is the safer move, and it's legal.

One further exception: you may overtake two-wheeled vehicles — motorcycles, bicycles, bodas — even in a give-way junction zone where overtaking larger vehicles isn't allowed. Their narrower profile changes the risk calculation.