EDITOR – I a Metro Police official who lives and works in the Glenwood area.
I continuously see Metro Police being chastised by the public as if we do not do much in terms of truck enforcement and education. I have been a traffic officer for 20 years and have seen needs and demands of the city change. In my early years transportation was relatively based on rail and now it's trucks. As long as we have a huge influx of trucks to our port on a daily basis our problem will not get better.
The reason I say this is because most unscrupulous companies are employing foreign drivers and paying them a pittance. They are also unregistered and driving on a foreign drivers' license. We charge trucks continuously and we have statistics to prove this. Truck drivers mostly drive long distance, they are tired and work inhumane hours. They sleep in trucks for months on end. They simply don't care about being ticketed, where they park, what council property they damage, even being arrested.
I am fully aware that residential areas prohibit trucks and only allow trucks with nine ton tare, [but they] drive all over the place anyway. The police simply don't have the time to chase trucks the whole day, the job description of a police official is wide. The police always get blamed but the problem is everyones, but where do we start?
Secondly, this ongoing complaint about the police buying food from Glenwood Spar. The public must be made aware the police official works 6am to 6pm.
They leave home at 5am, some even at 4am if they travelling from far. They leave home without breakfast and lunch. Like all human beings we need to eat, drink liquids and so forth. Members have rights as well and are entitled to a lunch break. The food at Glenwood is good and prices are reasonable. So what is the problem? They only buy food and leave. Whenever people are disgruntled they simply chastise and bring down the police.
I am so sick and tired of this and decided to straighten out some issues.
Without prejudice,
Mr Govender
Durban
