For almost a month, Nelson Mandela Bay traffic officers have been unable to fine motorists for certain offences such as speeding, running red lights or driving defective vehicles.
This comes after the rollout of SA’s new traffic infringement system was botched.
However, officials say traffic enforcement has not stopped entirely because officers are still able to issue bylaw fines, conduct roadblocks, execute outstanding warrants and deal with driving licence matters.
Since July 1, officers have been unable to issue infringement notices under the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) Act because the metro has not received the official infringement books required to enforce the legislation.
The impasse has been compounded by the municipality’s inability to conclude a service level agreement with the South African Post Office (Sapo), which remains under business rescue, leaving traffic officers unable to issue Aarto fines.
The problem emerged during Friday’s safety and security committee meeting after councillor Jason Grobbelaar questioned if the city was ready to implement Aarto.
In a response, a report painted a picture of a system far from ready.
It revealed that 40 administrative staff still required training, traffic officers had not yet been linked to the National Contravention Register, the official Aarto infringement books were still outstanding from the Government Printing Works and the Sapo agreement remained unsigned.
The report concludes: “Currently, no law enforcement staff can issue Aarto fines.”
The department is also expected to meet the budget and treasury directorate to determine the financial impact on municipal revenue.
Acting traffic chief Pathmanathan Gounder said officers were unable to use the old infringement books because Aarto operated under different legislation.
“That was the system of the Criminal Procedure Act,” Gounder said.
“Aarto is actually another legislation altogether.
“So to write any offences, you have to have the correct books and we don’t have those correct books yet.
“Now, we’re forced to enforce the Aarto Act despite all the correspondence that we sent to them notifying them that we were not yet ready for that process because there are many challenges and they still insist and persist and we need to comply with their legislation.
“So basically, at this stage, we don’t have those books and we cannot write any cases.”
However, he said traffic enforcement in general had not been brought to a complete standstill.
Traffic officers are still able to issue bylaw fines, conduct roadblocks, execute outstanding warrants and deal with certain driving licence and roadworthy matters.
“So it’s not that we are not producing any fines but the main thing is the fines that we wrote out to motorists in connection with the Road Traffic Act like running red robots, defects on your vehicles and moving violations, all those kinds of things, we can’t do any more,” Gounder said.
Gounder blamed the delays on factors beyond the municipality’s control, saying the Government Printing Works had not supplied the infringement books and the city could not legally sign an agreement with Sapo while it remained under business rescue.
“They cannot supply so many books to all the provinces, so that is a delay from them.
“Also, regarding the service level agreement with the post office: you cannot go into an SLA with the Post Office when they are under business rescue.”
He said the metro had repeatedly warned provincial authorities it was not ready for the July 1 rollout and had requested to join an implementation phase at a later stage.
“I even wrote a letter to the chief director of the province to express to him that we were the biggest metro in the Eastern Cape and we were not ready,” Gounder said.
“So we tried everything in vain.
“We even said to them let us start on the third phase, as Cape Town, in January, then we will have all our logistics in place.
“We don’t even have the linking of the traffic officers to the main system.”
Though speed cameras remained operational, Gounder said the municipality had only 30 days to process infringements.
“We are still enforcing speeding because we’ve got 30 days to process the fines.
“We’re contemplating that Aarto will be ready by August.
“But if 30 days have expired you cannot process those fines.”
He said all municipal traffic staff had completed the required training and the city had fulfilled its obligations.
During the meeting, Grobbelaar urged the municipality to engage national and provincial authorities to temporarily revert to the previous enforcement system.
“We cannot have a metro with a traffic department left in limbo and unable to enforce road traffic infringements,” Grobbelaar said.
“Traffic enforcement is essential to ensure the municipality keeps our residents and visitors safe.
“Without enforcement, there is little deterrent against dangerous driving, infringements or unroadworthy vehicles.
“This places every road user in our city at greater risk.”
Councillor Gustav Rautenbach called for the city to declare an inter-government dispute.
The municipality generated R65.55m from traffic fines over the three months to May — R55.61m in March, R4.83m in April and R5.11m in May.
The deputy director for legal processes and municipal courts, Mzimkhulu Kwini, said fines issued before Aarto came into effect would still be enforced and that speed camera cases would be exported to the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) once the system was fully integrated.
“The director for public prosecutions has issued an instruction that cases 18 months old will still be dealt with,” Kwini said.
“We’ll be in a position to rake in our money.
“We’re going to conduct roadblocks, which are happening now.
“Money will be paid.
“Notices and SMSes have gone out.”
Kwini said speed cameras were operating and fines generated would be exported to RTMC.
“However, we need to link them to RTMC and those fines will be served to the offenders.
“It’s not as if nothing is happening.”
Councillor Marshall von Buchenroder said officials were saying the speed camera boxes were operating but had yet to be integrated.
“We’re opening ourselves up for litigation.
“We’re treading on very thin ice.
“It’s either you’re working on a system that’s fully operational [or not].
“Hence we’re saying let’s go the route of inter-government dispute because we’re not operational.”
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