SPANISH TOWN, St Catherine — Colin Manning, president of the National Association of Taxi Operators, was yesterday fined a total of $30,000 after being convicted of breaching five sections of the Road Traffic Act.

And he used the opportunity to urge the government to stop targeting illiterate taxi operators and focus on rooting out what he described as corrupt depot examiners who issue driver’s licences to cabbies who cannot read.

The association president, who spent the weekend at the Hundred Man Police Station in Portmore, St Catherine, yesterday pleaded guilty to having no road licence, no insurance coverage, no licence disk affixed, careless driving and driving an unlicensed motor vehicle.

The 45 year-old Manning had also been charged with assaulting a police officer, disobeying a constable and resisting arrest, but these charges were later dropped when he appeared in court.

According to the police’s information arm, Manning was picked up at his Greater Portmore home on December 6, after he failed to appear in court on November 13 this year, to answer to a charge of dangerous driving.

After Manning’s court appearance yesterday, the association’s general secretary, Egeton Newman, lambasted the police who, he said, literally took Manning out of his bed at about 7:30 am and arrested him.

The general secretary maintained that the police action was a deliberate move to get back at the taxi association which has been speaking out about bribery and corruption in the traffic department.

“We are going to ensure that none of our members are caught in this trap, as was in the case of our president,” Newman said. “We are now making every effort that taxi operators within our association with outstanding tickets make arrangement with us to go to the court and pay the fine.”

Meanwhile Manning, who said he was innocent of the initial charges and that illness had prevented him from showing up for his first court date, said he was glad it was all over.

“I paid $30,000… I am happy it is over,” he said, even as he blasted the authorities’ failure to weed out corruption in the traffic department of the police force.

“I am calling for an immediate investigation into the examiners who gave the licences to illiterate taxi men,” said Manning. “You cannot go harsh on one and not on the other. The persons should be held responsible and every effort be made to charge them, that is the only way to remove corruption.”

If the examiners were incorruptible, he argued, illiterate taxi men would be forced to “go to Jamal to learn to read”.

Yesterday, the cabbie association opened a training centre in May Pen where four volunteers will teach 24 taxi operators how to read over the next two months.

The next centre will be opened in Spanish Town as the association moves to establish centres in every parish. Their aim is to help about 2,250 illiterate members become functionally literate. The association has over 13,400 members.