Law that makes it easier to lose your driving licence fails its learners test
The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) says it is no surprise that the implementation of the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) system has been delayed.
Aarto is legislation that will overhaul South Africa’s traffic enforcement and introduce a demerit points system that makes it easier for motorists to lose their licence.
Under the new system, penalty points accumulate on a driving licence for every traffic infringement. After accumulating 15 points, the licence is automatically suspended.
After the third suspension, a driver’s licence is cancelled and they must retake their test. A demerit point is deducted from a licence every three months.
Outa CEO Wayne Duvenage described the system as being unworkable in its current form, adding that the civil action organisation has tracked Aarto’s development for more than a decade.
The organisation’s comments come after transport minister Barbara Creecy announced that the national Aarto rollout had been pushed back from 1 December 2025 to 1 July 2026.
“This delay was inevitable,” said Duvenage. “Aarto was never ready, not in 2020, not in 2024, and certainly not now.”
“These repeated postponements confirm what we have warned all along: the system is unworkable in its current form.”
He added that Outa supports any system that improves road safety and encourages motorists to obey the law.
“But the regulations must be clear, fair, and functional. Aarto fails that test,” said Duvenage.
According to the Outa CEO, the latest regulations were hastily pushed through without public participation, which has only deepened concerns.
He explained that the latest version represents a complete rewrite of the regulations, which were first published for public comment in 2020.
Moreover, the most recent amendments, published on 31 October 2025, include pages of illegible text in the schedules that list offences, fines, and demerit points.
“Citizens cannot comply with laws they cannot read,” Duvenage said. “That’s not enforcement; that’s confusion.”
He added that several municipalities have indicated that they want to withdraw from the system, as they see a bureaucratic and expensive process that won’t make roads safer.
“This postponement should be used to get Aarto right,” said Duvenage.
“If government is serious about road safety, it must return to the drawing board — build a transparent, practical system that supports enforcement, earns public trust, and genuinely saves lives.”
The Department of Transport announced that the implementation of Aarto had been postponed to July 2026 in a statement published on Monday, 10 November 2025.
It said the postponement was based on an assessment of some municipalities’ readiness to implement the first phase of the system on 1 December 2025.
“The Department will soon publish the new proclamation with new staggered implementation dates, the 1 July 2026 being the official implementation date,” the department said.
“The phased approach of implementation will still be maintained as initially envisaged.”
Minister should resign immediately
Driving.co.za managing director Rob Handfield-Jones agrees with Outa that the postponement was no surprise.
“The finalised regulations are a cluttered mess, which could have considerable vulnerability in any court challenge on their merits, let alone the lack of consultation apparent in their finalisation,” he said.
He added that the department has been repeatedly warned about the difficulties of implementing Aarto in all municipalities, but pressed ahead nonetheless.
The system will see a comprehensive overhaul of South Africa’s traffic fine system, including separating violations into less serious infringements and serious offences.
Under Aarto, traffic infringements are handled administratively by the Road Traffic Infringement Agency, while serious offences are criminal matters.
Currently, all fines issued in South Africa, excluding those issued by the metro police departments in Johannesburg and Tshwane, are subject to a criminal process.
Handfield-Jones described the postponement as an embarrassing “U-turn” for the Department of Transport.
“It has been so long since the Aarto pilot project was launched in 2008 that I’ve lost count of the number of times the launch of Aarto has been postponed, but we must be into double figures by now,” he said.
“The pilot project was supposed to conclude in December 2009, with Aarto’s launch in mid-2010. It is now 16 years later and 27 years since Aarto became law in 1998.”
He said the Aarto saga showed “rank” incompetence on the Department of Transport’s part and believes heads should roll.
“This is a flagship project which has yet again failed spectacularly and embarrassingly,” he said. “It is impossible to have confidence in the Minister of Transport — she should resign immediately.”
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