Motorists caught speeding because they are late for meetings will face the full wrath of the law, KwaZulu-Natal traffic authorities said on Friday.
Asked whether motorists who are caught speeding will be able to have their fines quashed, eThekwini metro police spokesperson John-Thomas Tyala said: ”We can’t allow that. The Act [National Road Traffic Act] does not allow for that.”
KwaZulu-Natal provincial minister Bheki Cele was quoted by the Mercury newspaper on Friday as saying that being late for a meeting could constitute an emergency.
”Last week my flight from Johannesburg to Durban was delayed. But at the same time I had an appointment that had been planned for weeks. That to me constituted an emergency,” he told the provincial legislature on Thursday.
KwaZulu-Natal Road Traffic Inspectorate chief John Snell could not be reached for comment on how his department would deal with motorists claiming that they were speeding because they were late for a meeting.
The chairperson of the Zululand coordinated traffic committee, Paul Oliver, said his experience was that the courts would ”look at life-and-death situations to determine whether it was an emergency. I haven’t seen a case where being late for a meeting was accepted as an excuse for speeding.
”If a law-enforcement officer is late for a meeting, he should not be speeding. I would not deem it to be an emergency in the execution of his duties.”
Oliver said that even in the event of an emergency, law-enforcement officers should still drive in a manner that was safe.
Victor Chetty, chairperson of the KwaZulu-Natal Coordinated Traffic Committee, said: ”That’s not protocol. The motorist [who claims he was late for a meeting] will need to explain that to the courts.”
Traffic officers who caught members of the public speeding, even if they were running late for a meeting, had ”no time to negotiate. They [motorists] will be prosecuted.”
Cele made his statement after the Witness newspaper printed a picture supplied by a motorist who used his cellphone to get video footage of a VIP convoy driving at 160km/h. Bheki Cele told the KwaZulu-Natal legislature the motorist would be arrested for using a cellphone while driving.
However, the Witness has refused to identify the motorist.
Cele said: ”We are taking the newspaper to court if it continues to collaborate with the law breaker.”
The Witness repeated its stance on Thursday, saying it would not hand over the details of the motorist.
Repeated attempts to contact Cele on Thursday and Friday were unsuccessful. Cele has not said the drivers of the VIP convoy would be prosecuted for speeding.
It was not clear whether the department would attempt to use Section 205 of the Criminal Procedure Act of 1977, which allows the state to compel any person to reveal their sources of information on pain of imprisonment.
This section was used extensively against journalists during the apartheid era. — Sapa