Department of Home Affairs offices will be open on the weekend starting from April 1, the department said on Saturday.
”This is to accommodate those who cannot visit our offices during the normal office hours by providing them with extra opportunities to access our services,” said departmental spokesperson Nkosana Sibuyi in a statement.
Sibuyi said Department of Home Affairs offices will be open on Saturdays from 8am to 1pm in all nine provinces.
Offices in the east and west of KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and the Eastern Cape have already started operating on Saturdays.
People in KwaDukuza, Prospection, Ugu, Ixopo, Kokstad, Amajuba, Ladysmith and Vryheid in KwaZulu-Natal can already visit home affairs offices on Saturdays.
The offices in Mpumalanga include Witbank, Middleburg, Ermelo and KwaMhlanga. In the Eastern Cape, they include Port Elizabeth, Mthatha, King Williams Town, Grahamstown, East London, Queenstown and Cradock.
In Gauteng West, only offices in Johannesburg city centre, Sandton, Randburg and will be open, while in Gauteng East all the offices will be open.
The extension is also aimed at ”mobilising people to apply and collect their identity documents so that they can vote in the forthcoming local government elections”, Sibuyi said. — Sapa