Upheaval at road agency

SUSPENSIONS: CALL TO POSTPONE IMPLEMENTING ROAD OFFENCES ACT

Registrar, senior employees in hot water after audit, whistleblower reports.

Implementing the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) Act (as amended) countrywide would be reckless now that a forensic investigation has been launched into the activities of the registrar of the Road Traffic Infringement Agency (RTIA).

This is according to Howard Dembovsky, chair of Justice Project South Africa, who was speaking in the wake of the shock suspensions of registrar Japh Chuwe and other unnamed “senior employees” of the RTIA.

The agency was brought into being by the Aarto Act, which creates an administrative scheme of dealing with traffic fines and, in its amended form, nearly removes the jurisdiction of the lower courts over them.

“The suspensions are being said by the RTIA to have arisen from the findings of the auditor-general regarding the RTIA’s 2019-20 audit, coupled with whistleblower reports of serious maladministration involving these individuals,” Dembovsky said.

The RTIA board took the decision, effective from yesterday, due to findings of serious maladministration by the auditor-general and whistleblower reports.

“Having appraised itself with the AGSA findings and whistleblower reports, a forensic investigations firm has been appointed to conduct a forensic investigation,” RTIA spokeswoman Monde Mkalipi said in the statement.

“Once the forensic report is rendered, the board will consider the recommendations, take legal advice thereon and then take the

This does not bode well for a SOE the public will have to trust to handle billions of rands.

appropriate decision on whether there exists any merit for RTIA to proceed with disciplinary action against the registrar/chief executive officer and such other implicated senior employees.”

Advocate Mncedisi Bilikwana, the RTIA’s executive head of legal and governance, has been appointed as acting registrar and CEO in the interim.

Dembovsky added the fact the maladministration was uncovered by the auditor-general strongly suggested it involved finances.

“This does not bode well for a [state-owned enterprise] that the public will soon have to trust to handle billions of rands in traffic fine revenue,” he added.

He said the Amendment Act, signed by the president in August 2019, and the draft Regulations published for public comment on 2 October, 2020 “unashamedly favour profit over road safety”.

He said they envisage a vast flood of revenue which, in South Africa, has proven an open invitation to corruption in SOEs.

“The Amendment Act and draft regulations perpetuate the stench of road safety as a cash cow.”

“This latest development gives credence to criticism that the department of transport has not held the RTIA at arms’ length in lawmaking

“In fact, the RTIA, which is the very body which the Aarto Act governs, was allowed to receive public submissions on the regulations, represents an extraordinary conflict of interest.”

Aarto’s planned national implementation date is 1 July this year.

Howard Dembovsky Justice Project SA