More than a year after the Office of the Public Protector and the Public Service Commission released damning findings and recommendations relating to the issuing of 350 fraudulent taxi operating licenses by the Northern Cape Department of Transport, Safety and Liaison, there has still been no consequence management.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) will request that the Provincial Regulating Entity (PRE) appear before the legislature portfolio committee to account for dragging its feet on this matter, that originated between June 2015 and December 2016.
According to a reply by the department, they have spent approximately R300 000 on related litigation costs, including disciplinary hearings. It has also not started with the process of quantifying the actual losses incurred due to the fraudulent licenses.
The department further indicates that it will only proceed with the implementation of consequence management against the implicated officials, once the self-review process, to withdraw the fraudulently issued operating licenses in the High Court, is finalized.
Meanwhile, one of the two implicated officials resigned and the other retired in 2023, with only part of his pension pay-out reserved for possible future litigation.
The DA will demand that the department, which initially placed the implicated officials on precautionary transfer to other sub-directorates, must explain why it continues to protect them at the expense of legitimate taxi operators.
The department takes an average of 18 months to issue permits and only gazetted and published 938 outstanding operating license applications dating back to 2019, in September last year, leaving a remaining backlog of 594 applications.
The DA will therefore also request that the PRE presents the committee with a plan on how it will address this unacceptable backlog, that is fueling the increasingly unregulated and largely non-compliant transport industry in the province.
While the taxi industry forms the backbone of public transport, failure to properly regulate it will hinder its full economic potential.