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The Road Traffic Management Corporation is trying to get away from the illegal threat it made this week: that motorists who find themselves with outstanding tickets will not be allowed to continue their trips.
“The Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) advises all drivers to check for outstanding traffic tickets before embarking on their holiday trips,” read a paragraph of the statement.
He went on to say that traffic officers were “being deployed on all major routes and those with outstanding traffic tickets will not be able to continue.”
However, South African Justice Project Chairman Howard Dembovsky noted Friday that “there is no provision in any law that authorizes traffic officers to prevent motorists from following a journey if they are found to have traffic tickets. slopes”.
Similarly, the Automobile Association (AA) yesterday criticized the RTMC, saying the statement was “outrageous and amounts to generating fear among South African road users.”
ALSO READ: Only ticketed delinquent motorists will be arrested, clarifies the traffic authority
The AA asked RTMC to “immediately retract the statement and apologize to motorists for creating a false impression of the RTMC’s law enforcement capabilities.”
“A traffic ticket is not an arrest warrant and should not be considered as such,” Dembovsky said. “A judicial officer issues an arrest warrant if a person has been summoned to court and has not appeared.”
The citizen asked RTMC spokesman Simon Zwane via WhatsApp what legislation allowed traffic officers to prevent drivers with pending traffic tickets from continuing a trip.
He replied: “I said that people should check if they don’t have arrest warrants in their name. Orders issued in terms of the Criminal Procedure Law (CPA).
“Many parts of the country are using CPA section 56 notifications to issue traffic tickets and arrest warrants are being issued for people who do not pay and do not appear in court. It is not an Aarto process. “
But, as Zwane pointed out, an arrest warrant is very different from an ordinary traffic ticket, which has yet to be paid.
“They are orders issued against unpaid traffic tickets and failure to appear in court on the date indicated in the traffic notice issued,” he said. “So we were referring to fines that have reached the stage where a court order has been issued.”
But this is not mentioned in the statement and many motorists have had the misfortune to meet a traffic officer with the “I am the law” mentality.
Dembovsky said that this press release would encourage traffic officers to break the law.
“It is the traffic officer who will be sued and not the RTMC. It would be nice if the RTMC were sued for presenting these ridiculous threats.
Dembovsky said that a traffic ticket was an accusation of wrongdoing and not a bill or a “tax.”
“Preventing someone from taking a trip with a pending traffic ticket constitutes a de facto illegal arrest. Forcing those people to pay a fine under threat of formal arrest constitutes extortion. “
Dembovsky added that the RTMC had “for many years” threatened motorists allegedly driving under the influence of alcohol with “a minimum of seven days in jail” before they were allowed to request bail.
“There is no such provision in the law that authorizes it.”
The AA was concerned that officers would use the above statement to “enforce traffic laws as they see fit.”
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