Experts to look into road deaths

Dipuo Peters - Image GCIS

The team will be drawn from her department, the SA National Roads Agency Ltd, the Road Traffic Infringement Agency, and the Road Accident Fund (RAF), she told reporters at Parliament.

"The areas of focus would include reviewing existing legislation under the National Road Traffic Act, road structural challenges and educational campaigns aimed at raising awareness about road safety hazards among motorists, passengers, and pedestrians alike," she said.

The team would be sent to hotspots to identify hazards and interventions to prevent the recurrence of fatal crashes.

"The team will report to me on a monthly basis regarding trends and magnitude of crashes experienced during that particular month," she said.

Peters said road accidents and deaths cost the economy R306bn each year. "This includes loss of manpower and skills due to fatalities and injuries, emergency medical services, post-crash services, such as road repairs and clean-up operations, compensation paid out by our agency the Road Accident Fund and so forth."

The RAF paid out R15bn a year to road crash victims.

More police officers

In addition to the team of experts, Peters wants to increase the number of law enforcement officers on the road. There are currently 18,000 traffic officials policing 10m vehicles on the country's roads.

Several amendments to the National Road Traffic Act were already drawn up or in the process of being promulagated.

"These include amendments to introduce a two-year probation period for first-time applicants of driver's licences, and the reduction of the legal alcohol content limit to 0.02% for drivers," she said.

Public transport and freight transport drivers would not be allowed to have any alcohol in their blood.

"We need laws that bite and assist behavioural change within the South African motoring community," said Peters. "Behaviour that is inconsistent with the law must attract the necessary penalties."

The aim was to halve South Africa's annual road fatalities of 14,000 by 2020. Peters asked the private sector, specifically fleet owners,to play their part in reducing accidents. "Fleet owners have a responsibility to ensure the roadworthiness of their vehicles before assigning them to drivers," Peters said.

"We will hold fleet owners accountable for collisions or crashes caused by unroadworthy vehicles in their fleet," she added.

Peters said in addition to these and other interventions, investigations of corruption at driving testing centres were being scaled up. Several people had already been arrested.

"It remains a major area of concern for us because it's at this level that untrained and unqualified drivers are issued with licences and unroadworthy vehicles are certified to be roadworthy," the minister said. "It's like giving someone a loaded gun."

She said the department was considering installing cameras at testing centres and that she would conduct unannounced inspections at centres around the country.

Source: Sapa via I-Net Bridge