Johannesburg- A motor vehicle examiner from a private roadworthiness testing centre in Johannesburg will appear in the Roodepoort Magistrate's Court on Monday morning on charges of fraud, the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) said.
The 57-year-old man was arrested on Friday on allegations that he had issued a roadworthy certificate to an unroadworthy vehicle that he never subjected to the required examination, RTMC spokesman Simon Zwane said on Sunday.
Members of the RTMC's national traffic anti-corruption unit (NTACU) initiated an investigation after receiving information from the Free State traffic department that an impounded vehicle had obtained a roadworthiness certificate while the vehicle was in their pound, he said.
The vehicle was impounded in Reddersburg in the Free State on September 8 after traffic officers found multiple faults with it. Five days later the owner tried to have the vehicle released after obtaining a roadworthiness certificate from a private testing station in Gauteng.
"Members of NTACU, together with the South Police Service Gauteng special task team and the Gauteng traffic police compliance unit raided the private station on Friday and arrested the man who had signed the roadworthy certificate."
Unroadworthy vehicles were a major problem on South African roads and contributed immensely to road crashes and fatalities, Zwane said.