Kazembe Admits Errors in Harare's Smart Traffic System Amid Motorist Complaints

Home Affairs Minister Kazembe Kazembe stood in the National Assembly recently and said something governments rarely say about a new enforcement tool: it gets things wrong. The tool is the Smart Traffic Management System, known as STMS, now running at 20 locations around Harare, and the admission came after motorists complained that police had fined them on the basis of misidentified vehicles.

The system works through number plate recognition. Cameras capture the registration details of vehicles committing traffic offences, and the owners are then notified of the fine and the offence they are said to have committed. Many people have seen it as a remedy for the road lawlessness that Harare is known for, where motorists routinely ignore the rules.

The complaints, as Kazembe described them, concern accuracy. He said the government has evidence that the system is making mistakes when it captures details, and he gave an example: it may miss a single digit. One wrong character in a registration number could be enough to attach an offence to a driver who was nowhere near the scene. Motorists have accused the Zimbabwe Republic Police of prejudicing them in this way, saying they were wrongly identified and fined for offences they say they did not commit.

Kazembe did not frame the problem only as a technical fault. He pointed to a step that is supposed to sit between the camera and the fine. Under the system's design, a validation process takes place before any ticket is issued, which means officers are meant to check the captured details first. If a wrong number is getting through, he suggested, that check is not working as intended, and someone may have missed it. He called this a gap in operations rather than only in the technology.

He said he has spoken to the Commissioner General of Police about the complaints and asked that they be dealt with. The system is new, he told lawmakers, and he was not trying to justify the errors. The government, he said, takes responsibility and is treating the matter as urgent. He also said the issue is already being examined from an operational perspective.

Opposition lawmaker Ropafadzo Makumire of the Citizens Coalition for Change was blunt in response. She said the system should be perfected first, arguing that in its present state it is robbing people. She credited the minister with a good idea, but said the cameras are sending motorists pictures that do not match the offences attributed to them. Her proposal was that the system should only begin operating once the public is satisfied it works properly, and that in the meantime the authorities should describe it openly as a pilot project.

The exchange leaves a few things unsettled. The minister acknowledged errors but did not give a figure for how many fines may have been wrongly issued, and the reporting does not say how affected motorists can contest or reverse a ticket. It also remains unclear whether the police will tighten the validation step, pause fines while the complaints are reviewed, or accept Makumire's call to label the system a pilot. Those are the decisions to watch as the review proceeds.