PRETORIA – Not paying toll is an infringement under the South African National Roads Agency (Sanral) and National Roads Act and offenders will be prosecuted.
Collins Letsoalo, acting CEO of the Road Traffic Management Corporation, told journalists on Tuesday that an Amendment Bill is in the pipeline to make sure that the administrative processes to reprimand and prosecute toll offenders is in place.
The administrative processes that govern how these offenders will be targeted are more complicated.
For Johannesburg and Tshwane, where the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences Act (Aarto) is already rolled-out, will follow one process, while offenders infringing in Ekurhuleni will be prosecuted under the Criminal Procedures Act, said Letsoalo.
Letsoalo said that this effectively only means that there are different “vehicles” to enforce the act that is being transgressed if people don’t pay tolls.
If a driver drives the whole e-toll route and refuses or neglects to pay toll at all the gantries, he will receive notices through Aarto and be prosecuted under the Criminal Procedures Act, the first for his infringement in Johannesburg and Tshwane and the second for the infringement in Ekurhuleni.
Transport director-general George Mahlalela said in earlier media reports that the draft bill was ready to go to cabinet and would be made public only after then.
Moneyweb has learned that the purpose of the bill is to amend the Sanral Act to provide more effectively for law enforcement relating to the collection of tolls. Also to amend the Aarto Act to include in its ambit offences relating to operating licences and cross-border permits for public transport services and offences relating to non-payment of tolls on national roads. Other acts it will aim to amend include the National Road Traffic Act, the Road Traffic Management Corporation Act and the Cross-Border Road Transport Act.
Apparently in the Sanral Act it proposes to amend certain sections to state that any person driving or using the toll road is liable for tolls levied and must register as a toll road user and pay the fees. No person may use the toll road at a time when he or she owes toll or any other amount in terms of the Act and any person who refuses to pay toll is guilty of an offence and punishable on conviction with imprisonment for a period not longer than six months or a fine.
The amendment bill will also aim to give authorised employees who have been appointed peace officers more powers as law enforcement officers to question drivers on whether tolls have been paid or ask drivers to provide their particulars and proof thereof and require them to show e-tags.
The draft legislation was expected to come before Cabinet at its March 7 meeting. Letsoalo did not indicate whether it was indeed presented to Cabinet.
Tiyani Rikhotso, spokesperson for the Department of Transport, could not be reached to indicate whether the legislation was presented to Cabinet or not.
When asked if the National Traffic Intervention Unit, which will be among other things responsible for policing the e-toll freeways, Letsoalo said that “they are as ready as can be”.
The unit was created to enforce traffic rules on all of South Africa’s roads, but will also have the responsibility to police the e-toll freeways. It only has 280 officers responsible for the more than 600 000km of roads in South Africa.
Letsoalo said he does not believe that not paying your tolls counts as an offence for which you can be arrested, but that notices will be issued and the process will be followed for each offence.
He did not want to comment on the administrative burden if the public heed trade confederation Cosatu’s call for civil disobedience.
“We’ll catch those we catch. In South Africa lots of things happen and not all criminals are caught, but those we can, we’ll catch,” he said.
