In May 2019, LTA Impounded 127 Devices & Caught 325 Offenders; Promises #WeAreWatchingYou

Do you know what is anatidaephobia?

It is the irrational fear that somewhere in the world, somehow, a duck is watching you.

Is there such a thing as anLTApobia?

An irrational fear that somewhere in Singapore, somehow, LTA is watching you?

#OurEyesAreOnYou

If you don’t, maybe you haven’t seen this video yet:

LTA was promised that “#OurEyesAreOnYou” and that “#WeWillFindYou”. Sounds like a movie super villain, huh?

In the video, they have boasted that their Active Mobility Enforcement Officers (AMEOs) had caught 325 offences in May and impounded 157 devices in the month of May.

Pretty impressive numbers; they must have hit their KPI for sure.

All jokes aside, 127 out of the 157 devices are Personal Mobility Devices (PMDs) and 151 out of the 325 offences were due to PMDs being ridden on the roads or wrong paths, along with 92 cases of non-compliant devices.

The Dangers of PMDs

PMDs, when ridden dangerously, post a serious threat to the safety of everyone such as pedestrians, drivers, and themselves.

Just in December last year, a 13-year-old youth accidentally knocked down a woman in her 20s when riding on his PMD. Fortunately, the woman suffered only superficial injuries and the youth took full responsibility for his mistakes, showing more maturity and wisdom than many other offenders.

Also stated in the post linked above, there were incidents involving PMDs almost on a daily basis due to dangerous riding, and many would ride away to escape the responsibility or even push the guilt to the victims.

Needless to say, many Netizens on Facebook has been asking for LTA to simply ban PMDs altogether.

Many Netizens also appear less than pleased by LTA’s videos, claiming that LTA’s usage of words made it seem as if they “treat us like enemies”.

Some said that catching more offences did not show signs of a good job, but instead highlighted issues with the mobility laws.

While some just leave hateful comments with no reasons at all.

If you ask me, many Singaporean Netizens simply hate on anything even remotely related to the Government, and like old Chinese saying goes, “吃饱没事做” (Nothing to do on a full stomach), goes around leaving hateful comments.

Of course as always, there are always still kind comments showing support and appreciation when needed.

Going back to the point of LTA sounding like a supervillain, they did indeed sound slightly Thanos-ish in their recent posts.

After catching a rider with a non-compliant Iron Man PMD, LTA called it “EndGame” for him.

Glad to see some humour in such government-affiliated Facebook pages, but nothing will ever seem to reduce the hate that Singaporeans harbour for their own Government.

Maybe reduce the hashtags a little.