OPINION: ‘Law enforcement needs to get its act together’

Your headline today (Coast of Crashes, October 14) refers. There is no doubt in my mind that the plethora of road accidents is due to the failure of our traffic law enforcement officers to do their job properly.

Your readers have mentioned some of the infringements that regularly happen but are ignored. If it weren’t for the tragic consequences, one could call traffic law enforcement a joke.

In fact it is nothing but a disgrace – red traffic lights, stop streets, solid white lines, stopping on yellow-marked areas, following distance restrictions and exceeding the speed limits are all ignored.

It seems as if the officers’ main jobs are to congregate in numbers at road blocks and to check for outdated vehicle licence disks and unroadworthy vehicles.

For a number of years now at meetings with the Ray Nkonyeni Municipality municipal manager and his heads of departments I have pleaded for stricter enforcement, particularly for moving offences.

I suggested cameras at traffic light crossings and was told some years ago that ‘they had been ordered’.

Recently I invited Max Mbili and his HoD to join me at the Pick and Pay parking lot above the Margate police station one early morning to observe vehicles going through red lights – it never happened.

On speeding, we were told that the Deputy Public Prosecutor in Pietermaritzburg had condemned our equipment, and later had said that municipalities were using these devices as a ‘cash cow’, so for some years now there have been no speed traps – ‘Speed Kills’ signs ignored by the authorities with predictable results.

Road accidents will continue to happen unless this department gets its act together.

OLLIVER RANSOME
Immediate Past Chairman, KZN South Coast Ratepayers’ and Residents’ Association

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