KyO's NeWs - CRacKDowN On CaR ACceSsoRy VenDoRs

~ BorNeO BuLLeTiN ~

~ 01/11/2011 ~

Traffic police jotting down the details of the road offenders.

The traffic police are getting tough with car accessory vendors in a latest move to curb rising road accidents in the country, in addition to penalising errant drivers amid surging road fatalities in the first 10 months of this year.

The traffic police are also on the road to nab errant drivers who use mobile phones and text while driving.

"We are going to the root cause of this problem, the vendors, who provide and install these modifications like sun x (sunshade), fancy lights and car modifications, besides penalising the drivers themselves.

"We are going to interview the drivers to find out the vendor who installed the car accessories and we will take action against the vendor if it is proven," the Director of Traffic Control and Investigation Department of the Royal Brunei Police Force, SAC Pg Hj Sulaiman told the Bulletin yesterday.

"We are also mobilising our traffic police personnel to be on the move to catch errant drivers who use hand phones and text messages while behind the wheel, which are getting more rampant nowadays."

"The public has been asking the Brunei Road Safety Council what are we doing following the surge in road deaths for the fatalities to end," he added.

"Even though the roads are good, but if the drivers are still using mobile phones or text while driving, it would not solve the problem. Drivers need to adhere to the road traffic acts." He also wanted the media to interview errant drivers who violate the road traffic acts. It is not to shame them but to get them to speak as to why they do this.

Pg Hj Sulaiman yesterday met with police OCPDs from the four districts, Brunei Road Safety Council officers as well as officials from DST, B-Mobile and RTB for promotional activities to create awareness.

"It is puzzling to note that most of the accidents have occurred when the weather and road conditions are fine and traffic flow is smooth. Did the accidents happen because the drivers were using hand phones or texting while driving or did not fasten their seatbelts? We don't want to delay our investigation. That is why we seek cooperation from the telephone service providers.

"We have been conducting roadblocks to catch errant drivers. We find drivers using sunshade while driving at night which could obstruct their view leading to accidents," he added.

A major operation was conducted yesterday morning by the traffic police and enforcement officers from the Land Transport Department at the Kiarong roundabout where in just 45 minutes, 33 compounds were issued to drivers who did not follow the right lane when using the three-lane roundabout. The operation started at 9.45am and ended at 10.30am. Each was slapped with $50 compound.

Another operation was conducted yesterday morning at Kg Jangsak where dozens of drivers were caught using the side lane to overtake. "The public has been asking why we carried out the roadblock during rush hour when we managed to catch more offenders than during off peak hours. If the driver is responsible, then he would not commit such an offence," Pg Hj Sulaiman added.

In October alone (until Oct 28), 110 offences have been recorded notably using hand phones while driving with 28 summons issued, applying sun-x (12), driving with expired road tax (30) and modifying vehicles (26).

1To date, 448 cases have been recorded since January this year with expired road tax followed by car modifications and applying sun-x topping the traffic police statistics.