Traffic enforcement and inducement

Dec 19, 2024 Features / Columnists, News

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Editorial…

Kaieteur News- This newspaper has been reporting weekly on the Guyana Police Force’s (GPF) traffic enforcement campaign across the country, as they seek to bring some order back to the roadways.  We have also noted that despite the enforcement, road deaths continue and an average of about 60 people appear in court in Georgetown alone, for breaking traffic laws. We know too, that for every 60 persons charged, another 120 are let off the hook by rogue policemen who solicit bribes.

In our Wednesday edition, we reported that a total of 8,407 traffic cases were processed from December 1 to December 15, 2024, during enforcement exercises conducted countrywide. From December 1 to December 7, 2024, the GPF made 4,231 traffic-related arrests. According to a press statement issued by Police on December 9, 2024, the most common offences included exceeding the speed limit (695 cases), failure to wear seatbelts (223 cases), driving under the influence (DUI) (99 cases), and violations related to tinted windows (551 cases).

Further offences included 15 cases of faulty load packing, primarily involving motor lorries transporting construction materials. Additionally, there were 94 instances of motorbike riders failing to wear safety helmets, and 50 cases of riders permitting pillion riders without safety helmets. Police also highlighted that 69 cases were recorded for unlighted motor vehicles in the front and 72 for unlighted motor vehicles at the rear.

Guyana’s roads are not only clogged with vehicles and people, but also clogged by a dense smog of official corruption. It is what characterises local traffic culture. This is with less a focus on drivers and other road users, for a good part no saints themselves, and more on how Police ranks carry out their sensitive duties. It is about what starts with a traffic stop, and with what should be a traffic ticket (but is not) for those violations that qualify for such treatment.

From the traffic stops and the traffic ticket that is non-existent, there follows the next clever, well-practised line in the game: it is the traffic tricks.

A violation has occurred, and the traffic stop by ranks is justified.  As a matter of routine, a traffic ticket should be issued, and both the violator and the attending rank are free to move on to other business.  But the issuance of a traffic ticket almost never happens, if at all.  This is despite the fact that it was the GPF itself that had informed the public that such and such traffic violations should be issued with a ticket.  The first limitation is that the GPF rank has no ticket book, either by design or arrangement or individual practice. If there is no ticket book available on the scene, then it follows that no ticket can be issued. Regarding why GPF traffic ranks should be lacking such an essential tool in their daily road activities is a subject of much debate.  Concerning why ticket books and tickets are not present for use in the station houses of the GPF, only adds to the mystery (and the negative conclusions drawn).  It could be that ticket books are there, but nobody reaches for them, or cares to use them.

Now this brings us to the traffic tricks, perhaps premediated, maybe even prearranged, in the station houses from the fertile minds and long experiences of the duty officers, and as passed on to the ranks going out on the roads, either on foot or on wheeled methods of movement.  What then proceeds to take place is that in nearly every instance of a possible traffic offence being committed, there is an official offence gathering energy and spreading its tentacles. It is where the discussion begins, with unsaid and expected negotiations to follow, as a matter of course.

To proceed to the station house can be interpreted two ways. First, it is of a dedicated Police rank doing his duty, following his official training, or in a bow to the guidance from the officer manning the desk, and responsible for oversight of road ranks. Second, it could be a subtle invitation and overture at work to get the matter over and done with right there and then, with no time wasted.  Time is money, and the trade-off through what is experienced by both parties (offender and official) fixes everything in a hurry, with nobody else any wiser. Paperwork and bureaucracy and magistracy are all eliminated when there is mutual understanding to keep head down and open up wallet. This is what the absence, calculated or otherwise, of traffic tickets in the hands of Police ranks reduces traffic enforcement to on Guyana’s roadways.  Drivers demanding tickets draw a blank because there is none to give. It is part of what is now a consistent shakedown, as gleaned from the reports of frustrated members of the road-using public.

To be compelled to travel to the station house eats up time, with more given up there.  It is part of the feeling-out process, and coming to an agreement.  Always, the courts are dangled as where the matter could end up, and who knows how much more time will be needed, how many more in fines will result.  Most of those who have broken a traffic rule or regulation quickly settle, which is cheaper in time and money.  The ranks on the streets know this, and so do their officers studying the customers who are hauled before them. It would be shocking if Police commanders were clueless of this corrupt practice in play. Give traffic tickets to ranks, minimize temptations, help squeeze Police corruption.

(Traffic enforcement and inducement)

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• Editorial, official training, traffic culture., traffic enforcement, violator

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