East London - About 117 Task Team members in the Eastern Cape are to be recognised for work done over the festive season, which resulted in a decrease in road accidents and fatalities.
Eastern Cape MEC for Roads and Transport Gloria Barry will as a sign of appreciation, hand over certificates to them during a Gala Dinner on Monday at the Woodbrook Military Base.
The task team comprised 100 traffic officers, including new recruits and 17 road traffic safety education officials.
The team was launched in an effort to intensify the provincial Arrive Alive Campaign with a primary focus on drunk driving, reckless driving, moving violations, major route selective enforcement, passenger overload and misuse of government vehicles, among others.
The campaign saw 15 293 drivers being caught for various traffic law offences, 711 people arrested for drinking and driving, 579 stray animals confiscated on the N2, N6 and R63 as well as summons to a value of R1.5 million issued for various traffic law offences.
The department said the figures were expected to increase as the task team was expected to do its final round in the coming weekend.
Ms Barry attributed the campaign's success to visible traffic officers being deployed on the provincial road network and good law enforcement.
"The department's roving task team proved to be highly successful, traffic safety was also responsible for mass communication, road safety education and also had a task team to remove stray animals off the roads," Ms Barry said.
She said the reduced fatality rate was a huge step in the right direction for the department to reach its 2014 target of cutting road traffic offences by 20 percent each year.
However, Ms Barry noted that while the festive season statistics showed a decrease in fatal and less serious accidents, there was an increase in arrests.
"Our task team arrested more than 644 people in the province and 47 people arrested on New Year's Day," she said, applauding the department staff for their excellent work over the festive season.
"The staff of the department who worked over this period needs to be complimented as not even the rain could deter their great efforts and I applaud them," Ms Barry said.
