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South Africa’s switch to a modernised new credit-card style driver’s licence, in line with international standards, which will be integrated into the new Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences Act point demerit system, has been delayed due to a hitch in finding a supplier for a new printer to produce the licences.
According to former transport minister Fikile Mbalula the new licence card system was supposed to be piloted from 1 November 2023 to 30 March 2024, however, the Department of Transport (Dot) confirmed this week that it had been delayed.
“The pilot has not been launched. However, the project is now in the final stages of the procurement process for the card production equipment.
“The process to launch the pilot project has been delayed because no award was made for the appointment of a service provider following an open process,” the department told the Mail & Guardian.
“This meant that the tender process had to be readvertised for a suitable service provider to be appointed.”
However, the department did not provide a new date for implementation of the pilot programme.
According to the Driver’s Licence Current Account’s (DLCA, Dot the entity responsible for driver’s licences) latest annual report for 2022/23 the new card would include “smart enrolment options” that would allow users to start the driver’s card application process online before being assisted at Drivers Licence Testing Centres to complete it.
The adoption of digital technology and smart enrolment would introduce the alternative online channel to collect enrolment data that is not dependent on equipment, reducing the traffic at licensing centres and providing integration to other transport or state entities, such as home affairs.
DoT Director-General Dept of Transport, James Mlawu, noted in the report that the DCLA
has “learnt from the challenges related to the obsolete and ailing production machine” that the department is currently using.
“It has heeded the call to upgrade the technology of the production process with the new driving licence card and production machine project. Cabinet has approved the design of the new card and the tender for the procurement of the new production machine is in progress.”
Head of the DLCA, Tsholofelo Lejaka, said the project was capital intensive, with an estimated budget of R819 million to be spent over the next two years.
“Application will be made to the national revenue fund for the entity to retain surplus funds to finance these projects. Application for funding will also be facilitated, as the projects are estimated to exceed the entity’s cash reserves,” Lejaka said in the report.
The DoT said this week that the production process for the new card would be modernised and include improved security elements.
“The card will include improved security features which makes it more resistant to forgery. The new card project will involve the modernisation of the card production environment which will result in increased production capacity and a reduction in the card production turn-around time,” the department said.
“The card will be compliant with ISO 18013 which is an international standard for driving licences and will be acceptable to use abroad. The new card will include biometrics, holograms and watermarks.”
The department said “various options and recommendations” would be considered in terms of extending the licence’s current five year validity period, which would be announced “in due course” along with transitional provisions to accommodate the existing card.
According to the department there are currently about 15 343 067 drivers registered for various types and categories of driver licences, which cost between R140 and R250 to renew, depending on the province. This equates to revenue of at least R2.148 billion based on the lower renewal fee provided.
The South African National Taxi Council (Santaco) has welcomed the implementation of the new card, describing its improvements as “ideal”.
“We would be comforted to know that the manner of attaining a drivers’ licence is tightened and that the security aspect has been tightened as well. The hiccup experienced with printing machinery in recent years, was the biggest wake up call. We hope the revamped card will guarantee a timely turnaround time and harnessed security,” Santaco spokesperson Rebecca Phala said.
Phala said the industry was “keen to understand what informs the delay and to be brought up to speed on the progress made” but advised the government “to take all the necessary steps and not rush into piloting” until it had completed all checks and balances.
“We are keen to see how the new cards will lead to a reduction of reported corruption and security breaches experienced with cards in use currently and how it will resolve the backlogs in the turnaround from applications to the ultimate retrieval of a driver’s licence,” she said.
She said Santaco “eagerly” awaits the publication of regulations regarding the Aarto points demerit system.
“Whilst we support efforts to ensure that all licensed drivers adhere to the rules of the road, we would appreciate a setup where all efforts to ensure the realisation of law and order on the roads are not in contravention of material conditions that drivers encounter in daily commute which lead to the perpetuation of some offences,” she said.
Phala said the driver’s licence validity period “should be looked at in relation to the length of processes to be undertaken before one is licensed as a driver” as the current new application and renewal system was “unnecessarily tedious”.
“If things were to remain with the administratively long processes undergone currently, they need to allow licences to be indefinite and find other creative ways to assess one’s capacity to continue driving as they age. The process of eye testing, amongst others, which are looked into before one’s licence is renewed … need to be kept even if systems are to be relooked at.”
Road Freight Association CEO Gavin Kelly said licences need to be verifiable and as tamper proof as possible to prevent the ability to falsify them, while the sector needs an easily accessible database of legal, qualified drivers.
“The process to acquire (train and test), renew, upgrade and reflect refresher training (for example the professional driving permit (PrDP) requirements) must be as simple as possible with no lengthy delays or suspect testing processes,” Kelly said.
“The status of licences must be subject to clearly defined processes with validity subject to vision testing or clearly identified offences which incur licence suspension or cancellation.”
He said the RFA had proposed longer licence validity periods, subject to proposed criteria, and concurrent PrDP requirements.
“The association has also made various proposals as to how to alleviate queues, address backlogs and simplify the management of both desirable and undesirable drivers (all classes) on South African roads,” he said.
Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) CEO Wayne Duvenage said the organisation had long called for the five year renewal period to be scrapped or extended to at least 10 years.
“We have not heard any more about the delay. When we met with the director general last year we said we would like to know when the new machine is procured, what the tender process was, what the machine does, and how much we paid for it as a society,” Duvenage said.
“They have done nothing in sharing that with us. We are keeping our eyes open for the tender documents because it would be interesting to see what the specifications are,” he said.
He said the card was expected to look like a credit card and have a microchip with integrated digital technology so that information could flow from an identity document to a driver’s licence.
“It will be linked to home affairs and will enable the easy introduction of the demerit point system. The cards will have more functionality, the traffic police will have a reader that can read your card and see you have 10 demerit points,” he said.
Duvenage said Outa is not opposed to the new drivers licence cards nor the point demerit system but it needs to be fool proof against abuse and corruption.
The Aarto Act is expected to be implemented in phases from 1 February 2024, however, the Aarto Act Proclamations and Regulations have not yet been published. The DoT had not responded to questions regarding any potential delays regarding the roll-out of Aarto at the time of publication.