Interaction with visual devices including mounted mobile phones and dashboard monitors while driving will be a violation and will come under the purview of penalty, a senior official of the Ministry of Interior (MoI) has said. Maj Hamad Ali al-Muhannadi, head of the Radar and Scales Department at the General Directorate of Traffic, told Al Rayyan TV that any physical engagement with such devices during driving will be detected by the unified radars and will be penalised as per the Traffic Law which stipulates that being engaged with any visual medium while driving, including the mobile phone, would be a violation.
“Some believe that using a mobile phone, mounted on a base inside the car’s dashboard, isn’t considered a violation. It’s a violation according to the law. Simply touching any screen that displays visuals is a violation,” he said.
Al-Muhannadi earlier said images of motorists not wearing a seatbelt and using mobile phones while driving will be available on the Metrash 2 app. The new unified radars will clearly capture the two violations. According to him, the radars will differentiate between the seat belt and the cloth even if they are of the same colour. It’s possible to lighten or darken the image and extract a very clear image that the violator can view. We have a mechanism for processing and verifying images of violations.
The General Directorate of Traffic began the soft activation of monitoring the two violations from August 27 through automated radar and Tala’a cameras, a week before the official activation date, with the aim of educating road users about these violations.
SMS will be sent to alert violators but no fines will be collected before the actual activation date of September 3. The authorities have urged all road users to comply with the traffic law and its executive regulations to preserve lives and property, and contribute to the great efforts made by the various authorities, stressing that traffic safety is a joint responsibility of the society too. Starting next week, MoI will launch a large-scale campaign on its social media accounts and all media outlets.
