Traffic Police stuck with 20,000 driving permits

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | The Uganda Police Force is stuck with over 20,000 driving permits that have not been picked by traffic offenders. Some of the permits have been confiscated from errant drivers and multiple traffic offenders.

The drivers are usually expected to pick the permits after making payments for express penalty tickets issued to them by traffic police. However, many of these tickets are never collected and are now piled up at traffic police offices.

Traffic Police Director Steven Kasiima says that many of the drivers end up reporting the permits as missing or lost to enable them to process other documents as opposed to paying the fines. Kasiima was contributing to the discussion on the road bill, currently before parliament.

Kasiima, however, adds that traffic personnel have scaled down the rate at which the permits were confiscated since capturing them did not yield positive results.

He says Face technologies, the agency contracted to issue computerized driving permits has not been helpful in stopping the issuance of new permits to offenders. He adds that as a result of this lack of coordination, the traffic units have lost up to sh47 billion from defaulters.

Kasiima suggests that the new road bill introduces a clause that mandates Ugandans to carry their permits all the time.

According to Kasiima, as it stands now there is no law that compels Ugandans to carry their original driving permit a move that dis-empowers the police in the event that an offender is required to produce a driving license.