‘Law-abiding operators have nothing to fear from Aarto’

Operators who are legal and don’t cut corners have nothing to fear from the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) Act, said Collins Letsoalo, acting chief executive officer of the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC). Speaking at the Transport Forum in Johannesburg recently, he said Aarto provided for a fair, transparent and effective system and law-abiding operators had nothing to worry about. “Aarto seeks to bring a solution to the high road death toll in South Africa. It is not aimed at targeting anyone. If you are an operator that does not cut corners then you have nothing to worry about,” he said. “Yes, we can talk about the administrative costs of Aarto, but I don’t think there is a mother out there who says I can’t go and earn a living because I might die today. At the same time no mother sends her child to school just so that he can be hit by a car because someone is reckless out there.” He said South Africa needed Aarto. “It is a system that has been proven to work across the world and we believe it will work here as well.” Letsoalo said that a basic principle of the Act was the decriminalisation of traffic violations by re-classifying them as either traffic infringements, major infringements or offences. Serious offences such as drunk driving, excessive speed, reckless driving and hit-and-run cases will still remain crimes in terms of the Criminal Procedure Act. “Drivers and operators will incur penalty points for offences committed under the proposed points demerit system, which will be managed through the National Contravention Register( NCR) on the ENaTIS system. A threshold mark of 12 demerit points has been set – once these points have been exceeded, licences and permits will be suspended.” Aarto also contains a country-wide fixed penalty system for all traffic infringements.