South African Breweries has joined forces with the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD) to reduce drunk driving incidents on the City’s roads. Officials from the SAB and the JMPD officially opened the Alcohol Evidence Centre (AEC) in Dube, Soweto, on Friday, 28 October, with the SAB handing over an additional seven mobile units to the JMPD to allow for the seamless collection of blood samples from alleged drunk drivers.
With the assistance of the City’s professional nurses, JMPD officers will be able to use these units to obtain blood specimens from motorists suspected of driving under the influence of alcohol with the assistance of the City’s professional nurses. The AECs are all fully equipped to ensure that evidence is collected and stored properly so that it can be admissible in court.
JMPD Acting Chief of Police Thulane Khanyile believes the mobile AECs will go a long way in helping the JMPD fulfil its mandate of making Johannesburg’s roads safer for all citizens.
“Driving under the influence is our greatest challenge, and it is not always easy to successfully prosecute offenders. With these AECs, JMPD officers will have all the tools they need to make a serious impact and show drivers that drinking and driving have profound consequences,” says Khanyile
As the country approaches the festive season, the AECs will support JMPD officers in the fight against road fatalities due to drunk driving.
The handover of the seven mobile AECs at Soweto’s Dube Vocational Centre is in line with SAB’s Sharp initiative, a responsible alcohol consumption programme through which SAB can direct its efforts to create a more responsible drinking culture in South Africa.
It’s believed the mobile facilities will make Joburg roads safer by empowering authorities to enforce regulations and provide world-class infrastructure and technology to assist in the processing of drunk driving arrests.
Public Safety head of department, Tebogo Modiba, thanked the SAB for the partnership with the JMPD, as law enforcers, and the SAB, whose core business is to brew and sell alcohol.
“I am pleased by this partnership as it shows that the SAB cares for its customers and initiatives like these are a clear indication of the company’s commitment to encouraging responsible drinking,” says Modiba.
Recent JMPD statistics show a soaring number of fatalities related to driving under the influence (DUI) of alcohol and drugs in the City. Between January and October, the City’s police department arrested over 3000 suspected drunk drivers, some of whom are responsible for over 400 fatalities on the City’s roads in the fiscal year 2021/2022.
Zoleka Lisa, the Vice President of Corporate Affairs at SAB believes more interventions are needed to make South Africa’s roads safer, especially in DUI hotspots like Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal.
“Together with JMPD, we are well on our way to curbing this irresponsibility. Our mission is to partner with traffic law enforcement in trying to combat road fatalities, this has been made possible through interventions such as the Mobile AECs,” says Lisa.
Alcohol Evidence Centres have become critical in assisting law enforcement in testing suspected drunk drivers and confirming their breath limit using Evidential Breath Alcohol Testing (EBAT) and registered medical practitioners over the years.
Lisa says that SAB is committed to delivering 20 operational Alcohol Evidence Centres (AEC) across South Africa by the end of 2022.
“Our goal is to be collaborative. Working in partnership with public health bodies, civil society, and governments, we aim to implement evidence-based approaches, uncover new ways to reduce the harmful use of alcohol and act upon them. The AECs are an incredible testament to this approach and prove that it is working,” says Lisa.
The department is still preaching to motorists that drinking and driving will not be tolerated on the City’s roads. “Remember, dichomi, that friends don’t let friends drive drunk,” says Modiba.
Written by Bongiwe Radebe and Dakalo Ramudidibi
31/10/2022