KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Transport, Community Safety and Liaison, Mr Willies Mchunu, has announced plans by the provincial government to track down all the repeat offenders on the roads and those who fail to pay for their traffic fines.
Addressing mourners at the memorial service of eight people who died in a head-on-collision between a truck and minibus taxi on the R612, in Highflats, MEC Mchunu announced the formation of the Traffic Fines Tracing Task Team.
MEC Mchunu said the Track Team’s responsibility, amongst others, would be to trace, find and arrest repeat offenders and motorists with outstanding warrants of arrest where ever they were within the Province.
“This task team will execute warrants of arrest at the homes, work places and/or any other places of the offenders where they will be found,” said MEC Mchunu.
MEC Mchunu said the formation of the Track Team to profile repeat offenders and to chase them, would be vital to fight the lawlessness on the roads. This team comprises of experienced Road Traffic Inspectorate officers, whose jobs will be to hunt, sniff out offenders, especially repeat ones, at their homes, workplaces and even at shebeens.
MEC Mchunu described the Track Team as part of his department’s “punitive strategy” for traffic offenders.
The formation of the Track Team comes amid a growing number of transgressors who fail to pay traffic fines, thereby encouraging lawlessness on the provincial roads. In the 2012/13 financial year alone, the department issued 1056501 traffic fines with a total 595062 of these still outstanding to the value of R243.2 million.
“We want transgressors who break the rules of the road to not just get away without paying the fine because often they become repeat offenders since they can afford to pay those fines. This is one of the punitive measures by government to fight decisively with repeat offenders and motorists with outstanding warrants,” he said.
The Highflats accident involved a minibus taxi and a truck. The truck driver fled the scene after the accident but was later apprehended and given a R500 bail by the Highflats’ Magistrate Court.
Recently MEC Mchunu tabled the report at the KZN Legislature indicating a declining trend in road accidents and fatalities.
Since 2009, accidents in KZN have dropped by 33,6 percent. However MEC Mchunu raised concerns at the latest spate of road fatalities.
“We were all rejoicing the decrease in road accidents but what we have experienced recently is depressing. We have now formed the Track Team to hunt all the repeat offenders with outstanding warrants. This is one of the tough measures we are applying as government to fight transgressors on the roads,” said MEC Mchunu.
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