Call to extend driver's license validity
The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) executive director advocate Stefanie Fick has written to Minister of Transport Barbara Creecy to consider extending the validity for all licence cards to 10 years and waive fines and temporary licences for those whose new licence cards are stuck in the backlog.
This comes after the Department of Transport reported a backlog of 690 000 driving licence cards, arising from the breakdown earlier this year of the sole card-printing machine.
Outa CEO Wayne Duvenhage said after months of delay, the department had finally filed papers in the High Court in Pretoria aimed at overturning the R898 million contracts awarded to Idemia South Africa to supply a new driving licence card machine.
Duvenhage said the auditor-general took their concerns seriously: 'We commend Minister Creecy for acting on them.
This is how civil society, oversight institutions and public representatives should work together to tackle maladministration.' He added: 'In early September last year, Outa exposed procurement irregularities in this contract and submitted a detailed report to Creecy, who passed it on to the auditor-general of South Africa and asked for further investigation.
That request was accompanied by Outa's detailed report outlining allegations of procurement irregularities.'
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Duvenhage said the court papers outline multiple flaws in the contract, including a nearly R400 million cost escalation, from the original Cabinet-approved budget of R486.385 million to the signed contract of R898.597 million.
Also contributing was the use of outdated pricing, omission of printing material costs, evaluation errors in scoring, machine assessments and bidder non-compliance and weak documentation. AfriForum also wanted Creecy's to issue temporary licences free of charge to motorists who renew their licences on time, amid the backlog in the issuing of driving licence cards.
Spokesperson Louis Boshoff said the department had ignored workable solutions, such as extending the validity period of licence cards.
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