‘Traffic camera captured 856,680 infractions in 15 months’

.Lagos govt says councils have not right to arrest motorists over traffic issues

Lagos State Government, yesterday, said that about 856,680 traffic infractions were captured by the state’s automatic number plate recognition cameras.

The state’s Commissioner for Transportation, Oluwaseun Osiyemi, disclosed this during the yearly ministerial briefing by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of government to mark the first year of the second term of Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu.

Osiyemi, while providing a list of activities and projects the ministry had executed in the last one-year, said: “Daily monitoring routine checks through the use of Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) technology for prescribed particulars violations, 53 of the ANPR cameras are installed at different locations of the state.

“The usage of ANPR to capture other related traffic offences, such as vehicle moving against traffic, the ANPR captured 856,680 violations from January 2023 to March 2024.”

He further said that to reduce human interface, the Traffic Management Solution (TMS) devices, handled by the Vehicles Inspection Service (VIS) officers, captured 10,421 violations between January 2023 and March 2024.

Osiyemi spoke extensively about intervention programmes across different agencies and departments within the ministry, including Lagos State Waterways Authority and Lagos State Ferry Service.

Also, Special Adviser to the Governor on Transport, Sola Giwa, said that under the law, council officials have no authority to arrest motorists over traffic issues, saying that any official doing so should be reported to the ministry for appropriate actions.