A Capetonian had to pay for a traffic offence he did not commit and change his vehicle’s registration number after he received a speeding fine in the mail that was issued in eMalahleni, Mpumalanga, because he could not succeed in contacting the traffic department or police station to challenge the validity of the fine.

Mathew Kriel says he received the R500 fine in the mail in January. Upon inspecting the fine, he noticed that the vehicle pictured had the same registration number but bore no resemblance to his vehicle. He also noticed that the speeding fine was issued in eMalahleni.

“I received the fine in the post as I did other fines. But the previous ones were legitimate and issued in the Western Cape,” says Kriel.

He says he drives a white Renault and the vehicle using his number plates on the fine, is a grey Land Rover Defender.

Besides the obvious visual difference, he had proof from his tracking company about his vehicle’s location. Netstar emailed him a tracking trip report that proved at the exact time of the incident, his vehicle was parked safely in the Cape Town Central Business District.

Kriel’s problems began when he attempted to track someone down to present his evidence to.

“I only had a few days to pay the fine before I [would] get a summons. If I got the summons, I would not be able to represent my case before the magistrate as the fine was in another province,” says Kriel.

The Cape Town Traffic Department could not help him as the alleged offence took place outside their jurisdiction.

Kriel claims he tried to contact the Emalahleni Traffic Department numerous times and on various numbers, including the ones printed on the fine and details he obtained via a Google search. He also attempted to call the Witbank Police Station and other traffic departments in the area.

Kriel says all his attempts went unanswered or he got an automated response that the numbers do not exist.

This left him with no other option but to bite the bullet and pay the fine while starting the process to change his vehicle’s registration number to prevent future fines from being issued in his name.

Witbank News reached out to municipal spokesperson Lebo Mofokeng to get comment from the traffic department. Mofokeng’s response was that he could not give any feedback on the matter.