E-tolls: the next step… fines.

Media Watch – 26.08.2019

E-tolls: the next step… fines.

Recent news articles have been highlighting an Act passed into law by AARTO (Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences) which stipulates that ordinary motorists will be fined R250 for every e-toll gantry they pass without paying. Operator class vehicles (trucks) will be fined R500 and have one point docked from their licences. Licences could also be suspended for up to three years. According to estimates, there is a 70% non-compliance rate for e-tolls.

2016 figures show that 1.49 million trips were recorded each day on the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project, which covers 201km between Johannesburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni, with 42 gantries.

The passing of this law is seen as the latest bullying tactic forcing road users into registering on the e-toll system.

Fred Nel, Democratic Alliance member of the provincial legislature in Gauteng, said that the e-toll system must be scrapped before it causes motorists to infringe, or Ramaphosa should postpone the implementation of AARTO until the e-toll matter was finalised.

Farm Murders and race: it’s not that simple 

The very emotive subject of “farm murders” is a common discussion topic, with figures being quoted which appear to indicate that such attacks are predominantly racially motivated. On analysis, however, this is not the case. Statistics accumulated since 1996 show that the primary motives behind attacks on farms and smallholdings are money and firearms. The fact that victims of these attacks are beaten, stabbed and tortured to death (sometimes over a period of days when held captive) is due to the isolated locations where the perpetrators have distance and time on their side.  

The claim of “white genocide” being promoted by right-wing groups merely serves to fan the flames of racism, while in reality there are no reliable figures to suggest that white farmers are at any greater risk of being killed than the average South African. Again, according to statistics, approximately 10% of farm attack victims are black.

Civil rights organisations such as AfriForum are often criticised for representing whites only (particularly Afrikaner whites), but cases dealt with by the organisation prove otherwise. A case in point is that involving Mr Takiso Pharoe (2018) and his wife, who were tied and dragged to a field where Mr Pharoe was brutally stabbed and hacked to death and his wife raped. 

Ernst Roets, head of Policy and Action at AfriForum, reminds us that “race obviously does not always play a role in all farm attacks. We have to guard against exaggerating the racial dimension – especially when we have no proof for our assumptions.”

As South Africa develops into a mature democracy emerging from a racially fractured past, let us be reminded that crime statistics are high all over the country, not just in farming areas, with a shockingly high national annual murder figure of around 20,000 and 18,000 attempted murders (2018 figures). Compare this to a SAPS figure of 74 reported farm murders nationwide for 2016/7 and 357 farm attacks, and things are then seen in their proper perspective.

Brian Jones (SA7)
Brian’s Passionate Desk
Brian@BriansPD.World
http://bpd.trackbox.world
https://t.me/BriansPD 

SOURCES:
1. DA, Motorists will be fined for not paying e-tolls under Aarto, 25.08.2019
https://www.da.org.za/2019/08/motorists-will-be-fined-for-not-paying-e-tolls-under-aarto/
2. Sipho Mabena and Charles Cilliers, Aarto Act could see you paying R1,000 for single trip from Joburg to Pretoria, 26.8.2019,
https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/government/2171180/aarto-act-could-see-you-paying-r1000-for-single-trip-from-joburg-to-pretoria/
3. Leona Kleynhans, Farm manager brutally murdered, wife raped – DA FState, 21.03.2018
https://www.politicsweb.co.za/politics/farm-manager-brutally-murdered-wife-raped–da-fsta
4. Crime Stats S.A., Murder (Crimes Against The Person), accessed on 26.08.2019
https://www.crimestatssa.com/national.php  
5. Ernst Roets, Farm Murders and Race: it’s not that simple, 21.08.2019
https://www.afriforum.co.za/en/farm-murders-and-race-its-not-that-simple/