KUALA LUMPUR: Speed cameras are not only to nab speedsters. They will also be deployed by traffic police nationwide to catch queue jumpers, illegal emergency lane users and those who park haphazardly.
This will happen throughout Ops Selamat, which began on July 10 to coincide with the Hari Raya Aidilfitri festive season.
Federal traffic police chief Senior Asst Comm Datuk Mohd Fuad Abdul Latiff said that his personnel would be deployed at accident hotspots along the highways during this period.
He added that besides static monitoring at hotspots, patrol teams would also be deployed along certain stretches of the highways to monitor the balik kampung exodus, predicted to be at its peak on Wednesday and Thursday.
“This year, we have identified 60 hotspots throughout Malaysia, other than another 53 along major highways such as the North South Expressway and the East Coast Highway,” SACP Mohd Fuad told reporters at Bukit Aman yesterday.
He said 34,554 summonses were issued on the first three days of Ops Selamat.
“On Sunday, we issued 14,438 summonses to errant motorists, which is about 2,000 higher compared to the daily average of about 12,000.
“This is a bad start,” SACP Mohd Fuad said, adding that 4,184 accidents were recorded between Friday and Sunday, of which 74 lives were lost.
He said 48 of the fatalities involved motorcyclists, with seven of them pillion riders.
He added that with Ops Selamat going on, Ops Warta would be toned down to allow personnel to focus on emergencies, observation and patrols.
“This does not mean that we have forgotten about the Ops Warta,” said SACP Mohd Fuad.
“As soon as Ops Selamat ends, we will continue to weed out hardcore traffic offenders with multiple arrest warrants,” he said, adding that 96,269 arrest warrants had been settled since Ops Warta was launched this year.
