by Speeding is a lot more serious than what you may think. If you’re caught going 30km/h over the speed limit, in a residential area, or 40 km/h over, in a non-residential area, you’ll be charged with a criminal offence and get arrested. You also run the risk of having your drivers licence suspended.
Occurence of Speeding Fines in Johannesburg
Millions of fines are issued each year, according to the Road Traffic Infringement Agency’s annual report for 2014/2015. Over the past year alone roughly 6 million fines were issued in Gauteng. Of these, 5.1 million were issued in Johannesburg.
Speeding fines issued in The City of Gold alone amounted to over 4.4 million. With Tshwane far behind at 950 000 of which 502 000 were for speeding.
JMPD spokesman Wayne Minnaar said this was an indication of effective law enforcement.
“Many Joburg motorists take chances and speed, but get caught either by camera or physical enforcement. That is why there are so many speeding tickets issued in Johannesburg,” he said.
“There are about 4.8 million vehicles in Joburg and 800 000 drive into the city daily. As a result, there is more traffic in Joburg than Tshwane.”
Speeding Fines As a Source of Revenue
Contrary to this thought, Howard Dembovsky of the Justice Project South Africa commented that the number of speeding fines in Johannesburg increases every year. He dubs the cause to be the fact that JMPD is enriching private companies and chasing revenue:
“They have the most speed cameras and contractors. It is no surprise that Tshwane is bigger than Joburg but has millions fewer speeding fines,” said Dembovsky.
He explained that the number of speeding fines is high because “JMPD is more interested in making money than reducing road incidents. When JMPD chief Zwelibanzi Nyanda told the public protector that, if traffic fine revenue declined in Joburg, it would affect rates and taxes, it became clear that JMPD is more concerned about money than reducing incidents on the road,” he said.
Dembovsky explained that most of the fines for speeding were captured by speed cameras. “When you take a photograph of a speeding car, you can’t do anything if the driver is under the influence of alcohol or their licence has been suspended. The same driver could be involved in an accident later. JMPD should focus more on physical enforcement of the law.”
“JMPD doesn’t seem to understand that the purpose of law enforcement is to reduce incidents on the road. Not make money for the city.”
Rob Handfield-Jones of Corporate Defensive Driving site, driving.co.za, shares Dembovsky’s view “JMPD prosecutes speeding mostly because it is easy and profitable for them. Focusing more on stopping drivers and checking the roadworthiness of their cars, licences, alcohol in system and their fitness to drive will save more lives than taking photographs of speeding cars for a revenue.”
Speeding fines have become vastly more expensive over the last year. Fines such as failing to stop at a traffic light, operating an unroadworthy vehicle, and driving without a license have all been raised to between R1 000 and R3 000. Speeding fines are generally in the R800 – R3 000 range, depending on the offence.
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The rate of repayment on traffic fines is at an all-time low. Across South Africa, the rate of traffic fine repayment is as low as 20%. In Cape Town, Durban, Johannesburg, and Pretoria, there is an estimated R5 billion in outstanding traffic fines.
