Africa-Press – South-Africa. The Cape Coloured Congress (CCC) and motor racing enthusiasts are rallying to protest outside the home of Mayco member for safety and security JP Smith on Sunday.
Cape Town racing fanatics are seeing red over the City of Cape Town’s new traffic by-law, which is aimed at clamping down on illegal street racing and illegally modified vehicles.
Those who are caught will be forced to pay a hefty fine and their cars will be impounded immediately. Even spectators can be punished under the by-law.
Cape Coloured Congress leader Fadiel Adams said he met with the racing community on Thursday.
Adams accused Smith of harassing Capetonians after Smith said unroadworthy vehicles, cars with defective lights, or any vehicles that aren’t up to original SABS specifications and have been illegally modified, would be impounded and their owners fined.
The City said that the traffic by-law of 2021 was passed and promulgated last year to end the carnage on Cape Town’s roads. The penalties have now been passed and published in the tariff schedules for the 2023 financial year that began in July.
Adams said: “He is harassing people. These aren’t criminals. These are car enthusiasts. These are kids that work and grind and buy accessories which are perfectly legal to buy, but JP has made it illegal to fit,” he said.
Adams added that the plan was not to harass Smith but to air the group’s grievances with the by-laws.
He accused Smith of “yearning for the days of apartheid when decisions were made unilaterally” and said this was a modus operandi of the City of Cape Town.
Adams also weighed in on the ongoing taxi strike over impoundments, saying while he supported impounding vehicles that were non-compliant and not roadworthy, the City acted punitively by impounding vehicles and fining owners for minor issues like indicators that don’t work.
Smith said Adams was playing politics and feeding the racing community misinformation to maintain political relevance. He said the premise for the march was misguided because the group wrongly blamed the city’s traffic by-laws and not the National Road Traffic Act, which determines when vehicles are unroadworthy.
Smith said:
He added that Adams needed to address the matter at a national level and challenge the act at that level.
Smith said he advised the racing community about a provision in the provincial traffic act which could allow for the exemption of modified vehicles if the owner obtains a certificate from a certified engineer.
“I have given a proposal of how that could work. Many in the community have engaged me on the issue and are working on that. I will meet some of them on Sunday,” he said.
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