In the past eight months, police issued over $9 million in tickets to people who were not wearing face masks or not wearing them properly but the country is yet to collect a cent of it.

Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi last week said those ticketed will be able to pay their fines by May 15.

The Judiciary in a recent advertisement asked for interested parties to submit proposals to facilitate online payments with a closing date on bids by May 11.

Between September 6 and May 6, a total of 9,778 tickets were issued to people for failing to wear face mask amounting to $9,778,000.

For the same period, 723 people have been ticketed for other breaches in the public health regulations.

According to a breakdown by the police service, the Eastern Division has the most cases of mask breaches in the for the period with 4,301 tickets being issued. The second highest was Port of Spain with 1,268 tickets shared.

On August 31, last year it became mandatory that anyone in public must wear a face covering or be fined $1,000 on first offence. Since then, no one has been able to pay their fines owing to a flaw in the legislation.

Last week, Al-Rawi said he will ask Cabinet to give the nod for President Paula-Mae Weekes to proclaim the Electronic Payments into and out of Court Act 2018, clearing the legal stoppage.

In the past eight months, there were successive deferrals in fine payments because there was no legal facility to make such payments online.

Online payments became mandatory as a result of the pandemic in a bid to limit the spread of the virus.

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