The Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA), on Tuesday, said the use of body cameras by its officials on traffic management duty had been phased out with the introduction of the Traffic Management Solution handheld camera.
The PUNCH reports that in 2022, the Lagos State Government said it was deploying bodycams for use by officials of LASTMA for effective traffic management.
In May last year, the government also said it had deployed an additional 500 bodycams for more effective traffic management in the state.
In July last year, the agency in a video said it was introducing the TMS handheld camera devices to enhance transparency in its operations.
It was observed that officials of LASTMA were not wearing bodycams in some places in the state.
Speaking with The PUNCH in a telephone chat on Tuesday on what has become of the bodycams, the Director, Public Affairs and Enlightenment Department of LASTMA, Mr Taofiq Adebayo, said bodycams were no longer in use by the agency and had been replaced by the TMS handheld camera devices.
“LASTMA no longer uses bodycam. What we are using now is the TMS camera. That is the traffic management solution camera devices”, Adebayo said.
Describing the TMS camera, the LASTMA spokesperson said, “This one looks like a phone, like a mobile phone. It’s handy. It’s just like your phone.
“If you have a vehicle that committed any traffic infractions, instead of having a kind of confrontation with such person, from distance, you just set your TMS device, like a phone, you set it, it will capture that vehicle from distance, it will capture the infraction the vehicle had committed, it will get the registration number, the time, the date, and the area, the location at which the traffic infractions was committed.
“Then it will send it into the backend of the state government. At that backend, the name of the owner, and the particulars of the owner of the vehicle will be pictured through the registration number of such vehicle.
“There will be a notification on his or her mobile phone that he or she has committed a traffic infraction, and even with that notification, there is a video with an arrow that would appear along with that notification. Once you press the centre of the arrow on it, it will show you a video recording of the traffic you had committed, the time you committed, the date, and the area, so that there won’t be any kind of disagreement that it was me or I was not the one”.
Adebayo added that, “the first batch (of the TMS cameras) has been deployed to every LASTMA officer. We’re expecting the second batch now very soon”.
