Fikile mbalula
Mbalula: Minibus fatal crashes dropped from 11.1% to 8.2% over festive season
But 1,448 people still lost their lives on our roads.
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula said the number of fatalities on the roads this festive season saw a decline of 7% with 1,448 deaths recorded.
Those who were part of the small service on Thursday paid glowing tributes to him.
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula has urged travellers to check the revised travel schedules, which are impacted by the new curfew of 9 pm to 6 am.
The minister on Tuesday released the Transport Department’s 2020 festive season preliminary road statistics, saying there was a decline in road fatalities in six provinces in the past 20 days.
The Department of Transport has set a target to ensure a 20% decline in fatalities this festive season.
Transport Department spokesperson Ayanda Allie-Paine said: “There was a flurry of people trying to renew their documentation and we also had a stop-start phenomenon because whenever there was a positive case, we’d have to shut down operations.”
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula unveiled his plan to reduce the carnage on the roads over the holiday period in the National Assembly on Tuesday.
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula unveiled the festive season campaign for safer roads in the National Assembly on Tuesday afternoon.
On Wednesday, thousands of taxi operators affiliated to the alliance marched in Pretoria to spell out their grievances.
Fikile Mbalula told Parliament that passenger rail agency Prasa was contending with organised crime syndicates sabotaging the rail network, which its new security plan is intended to address.
The national taxi lekgotla was concluded over the past weekend.
Mbalula said his department would work with Treasury and the taxi sector.
This comes after an announcement from President Cyril Ramaphosa's office that he's in self-isolation after a guest he'd attended a dinner with over the weekend tested positive for the coronavirus on Tuesday.
Earlier this year, the Transport Department made a commitment to give the industry over R1.8 billion to help it combat the coronavirus.
The association said the contentious piece of legislation contains a tax, which could see motorists paying an additional R100 fee for every fine that they incur.
The latest draft of the Aarto Act will see South African motorists pay an additional R100 for every fine that they receive.
The incident, which involved a minibus taxi and a truck, took place on the R66 between Ulundi and Melmoth.
The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) is investing over R1 billion to repair the line.