More drivers have copped bills for damaging infrastructure with 15 drivers so far fined this year alone.

The billing system was introduced in 2018 to stop drivers from damaging Fiji Roads Authority properties which include traffic and street lights, as well as railings.

FRA Chief Executive Jonathan Moore says they have spent millions of dollars improving the infrastructure and those caught deliberately damaging it are now being penalized.

Moore says out of the 15 perpetrators, two have been cleared after paying their penalties.

“The last damage we have is about 6m long damage to the landscape and the fence and that’s around $7,000. If someone damages the traffic signal then that could be a lot more.”

He adds those caught damaging infrastructure end up fronting court.

“Four are in court and the remainder we are going through the process with police reports and getting the documentation ready. So we take them to court if those people don’t settle up without court proceedings. The settlement to date is around $6,000 as they were quite small once. The court cases will be around $15,000 and then there is the standing balance. The average is around $5,000 to $7,000.”

Infrastructure Minister Jone Usamate says every citizen must be responsible for taking care of road assets.

“When infrastructure gets damaged we have to pull out the money from a project that we were supposed to do in other parts of the country to fix something which would not have happened if people would just have common sense.”

The FRA CEO says upon identifying the person responsible for the damage, a bill is sent to them to be paid within an allocated time.