As old and new licensing backlogs in Dawid Kruiper municipality continue to grow, with the municipality only assisting about nine applicants per day, the Democratic Alliance (DA) in the Northern Cape has put forward an urgent plea to the Minister of Transport, Fikile Mbalula, to give motorists a further grace period for expired licenses. This comes as the deadline of 31 August 2021, looms for the renewal of licenses that expired during hard lockdown.
Upington residents start queuing early in the morning, hoping to be lucky enough to be amongst the select few to get assisted. But with literally only a handful of applicants being assisted each day, their chances are limited. To make matters worse, the traffic office only offers certain services, or parts of services, on different days known only to themselves, further wasting the time of residents who unknowingly continue to queue for hours, making it even harder for them to get their licensing needs seen to.
The situation is untenable.
Farmers and businesses and individuals are suffering. They are dependent on having valid licenses to be able to do their work and to be able to get to work. Young people are frustrated. They can only get to the offices after school hours and they simply cannot secure drivers’ license appointments. Other residents, meanwhile, are concerned about facing fines for expired licenses, which is out of their control.
The situation is worsening day by day.
The DA has written to Minister Mbalula’s office. It is not only the hard lockdown expiry deadline that needs to be extended. Since the start of the pandemic, traffic-related services have gone backwards. The Minister needs to take municipal inefficiencies into urgent consideration. Motorists must not be punished because of the municipality’s failure to properly facilitate license renewal deadlines, as set by his department.