Further postponement of demerit system possible

The deadline date of April 1, 2011 for the national introduction of demerit points under the new Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) system, could still be changed, according to Logan Maistry, spokesman for Minister of Transport, Sibusiso Ndebele. “I’m not saying it’s not April 1,” he told FTW, “but there is no date as yet. “The minister will announce the date in due course. Of course he won’t leave it till a week before, but he’s still to announce the date.” This followed reports that Ndebele had told the parliamentary portfolio committee on transport last week that the implementation of the system had been postponed to a date still to be announced. He said the rollout of Aarto, which was supposed to have started last month (October), had been put on hold to allow more stakeholder input.