By Robert Segawa
The Physical and Infrastructure committee of parliament clears the tracking system of the Digital Number plate project by the use of a security component days after the committee quarried whether it functions.
While at Nagguru Police headquarters in Naguru today , the Police team led by Inspector General of Police Abasi Byakagaba took MPs through the system and its operational environment and showed how digital registration plates can support Police in identifying, tracking and recovering vehicles.
The visit is as a result of the chairman on the committee of Physical and Infrastructure Mwine Mpaka who was notified by the police directorate of ICT where the Assistant Inspector General of Police Felix Baryamwisaki reported that 337 out of 375 stolen motor vehicles had been successfully tracked and recovered which represents a 90% recovery rate.
He wanted to verify how the technology supports the police force’s operations on the system, ending up having a practical demonstration how vehicle are identified using their personal registration digital plates.
Hon Mpaka established that cars and motorbikes can be tracked saying that the issue of digital number plates is clearly important adding that they just need to see how we can improve the system.
“As far as I am concerned, the system is working, and it is giving us solutions in our investigation,” Byakagaba noted.
The legislators were also presented with live location coordinates of the cars which impressed them on the role of the Digital Number Plate System beyond vehicle registration and plate issuance.
The demonstration came against the background of concerns raised during the September 28 hearings over delays in the issuance of number plates, production capacity, costs and communication with motorists since the Committee has been examining these issues alongside the security capabilities of the system.
On the issue of production inspection, Committee members were shown the full number plate manufacturing process, existing stocks of production materials and ongoing plate production and installation operations where currently operates at a production capacity of 2,500 number plate kits per day (50,000 per month), providing sufficient capacity to support current registration and fitment requirements.
Number plate production is carried out by a workforce of more than 300 Ugandan employees, while the project supports over 900 additional jobs in related industries.
The level of localization has already reached 80 per cent, making the facility the first full-cycle number plate production in East Africa.
The operational evidence presented to Parliament points to a system that is functioning and producing measurable results: the plate backlog has been cleared, registration and fitment times have fallen sharply, and Police are using Digital Number Plate technology to trace and recover stolen vehicles.
