The guests of today’s Rezime edition were Admir Katica, Minister of Internal Affairs of Sarajevo Canton, and Semir Šut, traffic safety expert.
“Even last year, we felt that this traffic problem, nevertheless, has its own weight and that the consequences that arise from such, especially traffic delinquent behavior, are really disastrous, tragic, they affect us all. We were also affected by this latest accident that took a young life, so last year we decided to look at this issue,” says Katica.
He says that it was investigated in terms of this police aspect, by the Working Group, which was headed by Semir Šut, and he was chosen, as he says, because he is a former police commissioner who achieved significant results in this issue, in the area Zenica-Doboj canton, from that police aspect.
“I believe, as the Minister of the Interior, that we should not look for new solutions, if there are already tried ones from our people. I tasked Mr. Šut and Professor Nedžad Korajlić from the Faculty of Criminology and Security Studies, and our commander of the Traffic Unit in the MIA of Sarajevo Canton. They researched it and indeed in that document they offered short-term, medium-term and long-term measures. Some of them have already started to be implemented at the beginning of this year,” said Katica.
“In order to propose measures and steps towards improvement, first of all, we had to detect weaknesses and they are directed in three directions, three types of problems. One is the action of the police, so that responsibility does not shift to other authorities. We identified the so-called pouring resources into some sterile places or where serious offenses do not occur. We have also identified that there is a lack of control from the leading police officers and we have precisely determined the tasks that the police officers should do with the prescribed measures. Another problem we identified is the Law on the Basics of Traffic Safety, which is being passed by the BiH Parliamentary Assembly,” said Šut.
He said that traffic culture is established by the amount of fines for the most serious violations.
“My suggestion is not to fall into the trap of a linear increase, so that the burden of this increase in fines is not paid by citizens who knowingly or unknowingly exceed 10 kilometers per hour. The focus must be on drastically increasing the penalties for the most serious offences. Certainly, a measure that must be introduced in the law is the permanent confiscation of vehicles for brazen and frequent repeat offenders”.
Šut recalls how they solved that problem in the Zenica-Doboj canton.
“In agreement with the judges of the municipal and cantonal courts and with their great understanding and support, we solved the problem by permanently confiscating the vehicles of such drivers. We confiscated the means of the offense. We destroyed such vehicles to the greatest extent”.
