Pretoria - If you accept bribes, you are an embarrassment to God. Minister of Transport Dipou Peters did not mince her words when she said this on Tuesday during the graduation ceremony of 200 traffic officers in Pretoria West.
“If you accept a bribe you are an embarrassment to God your creator and to your family. When they write about you in the newspaper they use your surname and it tarnishes your family name,” Peters said.
She said the habit some traffic officers had of asking for “cold drink” (slang for a bribe) money should end.
“Resist the temptation to accept bribes. Enforce the law without fear, favour or prejudice,” she said.
Free State MEC for Police, Roads and Transport Butana Komphela said traffic officers who accepted bribes under his jurisdiction should not expect the union to save them.
“When a traffic officer accepts a bribe, I don’t listen to these unions. I will take these unions to court until they run out of money,” Komphela said.
In his province when someone was arrested for excessive speeding on a Thursday, they should not appear in court the following day, they should instead appear on Monday morning with their clothes reeking of a prison smell.
Peters said she loved the idea that people arrested for speeding on a Thursday should only appear in court on a Monday.
“I have spoken to the Department of Justice and the NPA (National Prosecuting Authority) because we are tired of the traffic officers giving people fines of R10 000 only for the magistrate to reduce it to R200,” she said.
She announced that all traffic officers in all provinces would wear identical uniforms and the vehicles used would also be branded in the same way.
Peters handed over nine mobile testing stations, one for each province, enabling law enforcement officers to do their jobs better.
The mobile testing stations can test braking systems and faulty lights and steering wheel functions.
“The day of driving unfit vehicles is coming to an end,” Peters said.
She revealed that in cases of fatal accidents, unroadworthy vehicles were the leading cause.
One of the new recruits, Mologadi Ngoasheng, from Limpopo, won an award for the best student for her work during the 12 months they were in training. She said she was a second-year law student at the University of Johannesburg and it was through volunteer work that she wound up doing a course in traffic law enforcement.
“Not all women were created equally. The best become law enforcement officers and I am one of them,” she said during her acceptance speech.
Pretoria News