Programme Director, Kieno Kammies;
Western Cape MEC for Community Safety, Dan Plato;
Yusuf Abramjee, Lead SA & Primedia Broadcasting;
Gasant Abarder, Editor of the Cape Argus;
Colleen Louw, Primedia Broadcasting Cape Town station manager;
Stacey Norman, Kfm;
Our Lady of the Occasion, Ms Hazel Souma;
Members of the media;
Distinguished guests.
We are gathered here today, in partnership with Lead SA, to publicly acknowledge and honour Ms Hazel Souma, an 80-year-old Cape Town motorist, who has not received a single traffic fine since she acquired her driving licence at the age of 18. This is, indeed, a remarkable achievement for which Ms Souma must be congratulated and applauded.
We can all concede that during this 62-year driving period, Ms. Souma was tempted to speed at some point; at some stage she must have been late, and sometimes she drove under stress or boredom. But what makes her unique is that, amid the numerous challenges she encountered as a young driver at the age of 18 up until today at her age of 80, she never presented any traffic officer any opportunity to issue her with a traffic fine. Remarkable, indeed.
However, we have come to learn that there are many other drivers in our country just like Hazel Souma, who have been driving for decades, and have never received a single traffic fine. We have interacted with several of them at our annual Driver of the Year competitions, as well as during our inspections at bus and freight depots and at law enforcement operations.
Those who are turning our roads into killing fields are a minority, and they must be isolated and exposed for their deeds are not only a danger to themselves, but pose a real threat to the sustainability of society. We want drunk drivers, reckless and negligent drivers and inconsiderate drivers to have their actions disowned by their own families and friends for their destructive ways are deadly!
Over the past five days, more than 36 people were killed in separate road crashes. Yesterday, 12 March 2012, 11 people were killed in a collision between a truck and a Toyota Venture on the R56 near uMzimkhulu in KwaZulu-Natal. On Sunday, 11 March 2012, 6 people were killed in a collision near Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal.
On Saturday, 10 March 2012 evening, seven people died when a car slammed into a group of pedestrians in Tshaulu, near Thohoyandou, in Limpopo. The drivers of two cars were allegedly speeding, when the driver of one car veered into a group of pedestrians. This is murder, and we call upon the National Prosecuting Authority and other relevant authorities to act decisively in this case, at least for the sake of consistency. Last Thursday, 8 March 2012, 12 people were killed in a head-on collision near Queenstown in the Eastern Cape.
South Africans must value life! It cannot be considered normal that every day more than 40 people are killed on our roads, and every month we count no less than one thousand soul-less bodies due to road crashes, most of which could have been avoided. It is for this reason, we welcome the Western Cape High Court's 20-year jail term imposed on 28 February 2012 on mini-bus taxi driver Jacob Humphreys for killing 10 children, as well as the attempted murder of four others. We hope that this will serve as a deterrent to other motorists.
Together with the Ministries of Justice and Police, as well as the National Prosecuting Authority, we will continue to go all out to ensure that dangerous drivers are removed from the roads.
We want 2012 to be the year of action for safer roads. As government, we want to make it very clear that we remain steadfast in our resolve to bring down the fatality rate on our roads. The reduction in road deaths is not just desirable; it is an urgent non-negotiable, and has become our daily mission, which has called upon world leaders to work together during this Decade of Action for road safety and to share solutions to this challenge.
Coupled with intensified and uncompromising law enforcement, accompanied by harsher sanctions, we want to drive social conduct change programmes that would have as their primary objective to speak to the human beings behind the drivers of these vehicles we see on our roads daily.
Yesterday, 12 March, a motorcyclist was arrested for travelling at 226km/h in a 120km/h zone near Vryburg, North West. He will appear in the Vryburg Magistrate's Court today, 13 March, on charges of reckless driving.
Last week, more than 250,000 vehicles and drivers were stopped and checked, and several motorists arrested, including 5FM radio personality Gareth Cliff who was caught speeding in Pretoria on Tuesday, 6 March.
Last month, February 2012, 338, 384 fines were issued across the country for various traffic offences, and 6,587 motorists were arrested including 1,686 for drinking and driving, 74 for reckless and/or negligent driving and 236 for excessive speed. More than 5,000 (5,164) un-roadworthy vehicles were removed from the roads.
From October 2010 to October 2011, more than 15 million (15,051,565) vehicles and drivers were checked, more than six million (6,287,308) fines issued for various traffic offences, 21,575 drunk drivers arrested and 60,313 un-roadworthy vehicles (the majority of which are buses and taxis) discontinued from use.
Sentences imposed by the courts include hefty fines, imprisonment without the option of a fine as well as suspension/cancellation of driving licences. These motorists now also have criminal records.
Although these programmes have resulted in a slight year-on-year reduction in road deaths, a great deal of work must still be done in line with the United Nations (UN) Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011 - 2020. Road deaths dropped by 75% during the past (2011/12) December holidays on Africa’s busiest corridor, the N3 highway between Heidelberg in Gauteng and Cedara in KwaZulu-Natal.
Here in the Western Cape, MEC Carlisle has announced that “for the first time in more than five years the February Western Cape road death toll has dropped to under 100. Road fatalities in February 2012 fell from 129 last year, to 99, a decrease of 23.2%. Overall the 12-month fatality figures have now fallen from 1772 as at 1 January 2009, to 1289 at the end of February 2012.”
We will only win the battle against road deaths once all sectors of society take responsibility for safety on our roads. In this regard, we would like to convey our thanks and appreciation to Lead SA, as well as the various organisations and individuals who have made a significant contribution towards road safety.
Thank you also to the media who diligently report on road safety issues. We trust that you will continue to constructively help us fight this scourge on our roads.
Going forward, we will soon officially launch a new road safety strategy: “Towards Safe Roads in South Africa - 2015.” We are currently implementing several measures which, we have no doubt, will help us deal with this challenge of road carnage, including Road Safety Education at Schools, Community Road Safety Councils (CRSCs), Friends of the Decade forum, Zenani Mandela Road Safety Scholarship and Voluntary Traffic Observers.
Finally, Ms Souma’s unblemished driving record and sterling example is proof that we can put an end to the carnage on our roads. It is time that all right-thinking and like-minded South Africans say: Enough is enough – we need to take back our roads!
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Thank you!
