SONNY SERITE
The Botswana Police Traffic Department has raised a whopping P81 939 470 through traffic fines in just twelve months. According to Auditor General Pulane Letebele, this amount was raised through the creation of the Traffic Fines item in the Revenue Estimates which was specifically to facilitate the sharing of traffic fines between this Fund and the Government Consolidated Fund, to avoid the problems previously experienced in the use of the composite Judicial and Subordinate Court Fines.
Letebele however noted that this objective had still not been achieved in the second year of its operation. “The quarterly equal sharing of the revenues collected was still based on cumulative balances at the end of each quarter which resulted in this Fund having been credited with P81 939 470 at year-end while the Consolidated Fund remained with only P24 948 141. By this treatment the Fund has benefited at the expense of Public revenue,’’ Pulane noted in her report on the Accounts of the Botswana Government for the Financial Year ended 31st March 2017 which was handed to Minister of Finance and Economic Development Kenneth Matambo on 2nd March.
The Auditor General noted that while the duties of the various divisions of the Police Service may be interconnected, it has to be stressed that the terms of the Fund Order require that expenditures from the Fund should be in items or matters that relate to the curbing of road traffic offences. ‘‘In this instance, it is questionable whether the 5 land rovers purchased for P3 526 544 for CKGR from the Fund would be used on road-traffic-related duties in that area in view of the paucity of vehicular traffic,’’ Letebele questioned in her report.