DA wants to use e-tolls to win Gauteng

Johannesburg - The Democratic Alliance (DA) has further outlined its plans to win Gauteng in next year’s election by pledging to have e-tolls scrapped, reported BusinessTech.

In June, DA leader Helen Zille said what seemed unimaginable a few years ago is now looking likely: Victory in Gauteng next year.

On Wednesday Mmusi Maimane, DA candidate for premier of Gauteng used the e-toll issue to justify why the DA should take control of the province.

“There is no place for e-tolls in a DA-governed Gauteng. People don’t want e-tolls. They are too expensive and people are already stretched financially," said Maimane.

“Not only are e-tolls unfair, they will not work.”

On Wednesday the DA released new documents, which were brought to the attention of DA Shadow minister of transport, Ian Ollis MP.

The documents relate to the implementation of the Aarto Act, which governs how municipal authorities adjudicate and collect traffic fines in the City of Johannesburg and the City of Tshwane.

Both these metros have been implementing the programme since 2008, and have made use of the same eNatIS system that will be used for e-tolling in the province.

The Working Group report revealed that:

• In 2011/12 89.54% of required payments in terms of Aarto remained unpaid by road users;
• The figure was 87.56% in the 2012/13 financial year;
• The total amount that remains unpaid over these two years is R2.096bn;
• The sending out of courtesy letters for payment was suspended in July 2012 because of a lack of funds;
• The total amount over these two years for the sending out these letters was more than R30m;
• Only 0.58% of all required enforcement orders were distributed in 2011/12 and 2.4% in 2012/13;

The Aarto pilot project status report, dated 26 July 2013 also showed:

• The role players (City of Johannesburg and Tshwane) are not in a state of readiness to implement AARTO;
• Due to budget constraints, “there was a period that all Johannesburg Aarto infringement notices were sent by ordinary mail in direct conflict with Section 30(1)” and therefore illegal;
• JMPD has had “wasteful” expenditure of approximately R60m up to the end of June 2013 as the 2.4 million cases mailed out are outside  the timeframes in terms of the Aarto Act and regulations;
• The compliance figure or payment rate of infringement notices has dropped to less than 5% and is as low as 1%;
• If it is not adequately addressed before the end of July 2013, “the Johannesburg Metro Police Department will be required to stop all law enforcement or to revert back to the illegal process of sending out infringement notices by normal mail”;

“These revelations indicate clearly that the means to collect and enforce fines in Gauteng simply does not exist,” Maimane said.

“It also worryingly shows that traffic law enforcement on roads in our big cities in Gauteng is on the brink of collapse. This will have a devastating effect on efforts to reduce the number of lives lost on our roads if not urgently addressed.”

The e-tolls have been criticised by a number of organisations and Cosatu.
 
 - Fin24