Johannesburg - Transport Minister Sindisiwe Chikunga says the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) Act is an important cog in the road traffic law-enforcement interventions aimed at arresting carnage on roads and altering driver behaviour.
She said the Constitutional Court, in handing down judgment on the constitutionality of the Aarto Act, confirmed that indeed the law was constitutional and that no aspect of it encroached on the executive powers of other spheres of government.
“The ruling affirms our long-held view that this is a necessary law to advance our efforts in arresting the carnage on our roads.
“We welcome this judgment as it provides clarity on the mandate of the national government to determine and enforce norms and standards that apply uniformly across the country. A fragmented system of adjudicating road traffic offences based on the whims of individual provinces would undoubtedly result in chaos and render road traffic law-enforcement interventions ineffective,” she said.
Chikunga said her department was engaged with the Road Traffic Infringement Agency in order to assess the state of readiness for the accelerated rollout of Aarto across all municipalities in the country.
“We are pleased that the progress we had made on the eve of the constitutional challenge enables us to target July 1, 2024, for the nationwide rollout of Aarto. We have already established 43 service outlets across various provinces,” she said.
She said the implementation of this law across the country had been pending for 25 years, with pilots in place in the cities of Joburg and Tshwane. With this judgment clearing the path for the implementation of Aarto, we will move with speed to roll out its implementation across the country without delay.
“We have no doubt that the Aarto Act will make a difference by introducing severe penalties, which include attaching movable property to infringers, putting an end to a culture of impunity,” she said.
She said while Aarto addressed driver behaviour on the road, a blind eye could not be turned to criminality that made roads danger zones and undermined the economy.
“In recent weeks, the country has been subjected to criminality in the form of the torching of trucks on our roads. The impact of these criminal acts is devastating to the economy, considering that road freight accounts for approximately 1.5 billion tons of cargo movements.
“In addition, the main mineral resources of the country are located over 500km from the ports through which they are exported,” she said.
She said behaviour by any party that chose to remain outside of the legal framework would neither be condoned nor tolerated.
“We call upon law-enforcement authorities to unleash the full might of the law in dealing with those who think they can sabotage our economy with impunity.
“We equally appeal to other road users and communities to work closely with law-enforcement authorities and report suspicious conduct on our roads. We will not allow our roads to be used as an arena to commit crime.”
The Star