39 people lost their lives on Western Cape roads in the past week

39 people lost their lives on Western Cape roads in the past week, and 37 motorists made an accident.

This is 10 more than the previous week.

Of these, 16 were pedestrians, 11 were, passengers, 10 were drivers, and 2 motorcyclists lost their lives on the province’s roads.

Western Cape Provincial Traffic Services says it  implemented a total of 216 integrated roadblocks, vehicle check point and speed control operations across the province between 28 March to 3 April 2022, and 28 622 vehicles were stopped and checked.

The Western Cape's Transport & Public Works Department says a total of 163 speeding offences were recorded and 6 596 fines were issued for various traffic violations ranging from driver to vehicle fitness in the total amount of R5 702 250.

Traffic officials also arrested 40 suspects for speeding, reckless and negligent driving, goods overloading, possession of fraudulent documentation, possession of stolen property, obstructing or hindering an authorised officer in the execution of his/her duty, and intimidating a traffic officer. Majority of the arrests, however were for driving under the influence of alcohol, with 25 detainees.

‘’I would like to thank all our traffic officers for making every effort to enforce the law during these difficult times. I urge all the people of the Western Cape to respect the rules of the road. It’s up to you to make the difference,’’ said Western Cape Transport & Public Works MEC, Daylinn Mitchell.

‘’Following the President’s announcement to end the National State of Disaster last night, we will follow our normal procedure. Our traffic officers will use their handheld devices, and all the statistics will continue to be manually recorded and consolidated,’’ Mitchell added.

The MEC is expected to announce the Western Cape’s Easter Season Safety Plan, next week.

‘’As the Easter weekend is fast approaching, we are gearing up to launch our focused traffic safety campaign. Just as during the festive season, we are once again expecting a significant movement of vehicular traffic on our roads as many people are intending to travel to various destinations including into the province during the long weekend.’’

 

PICTURED: MEC Daylinn Mitchell at Bush Radio

Done By: Mitchum George