South Africa’s driving licence card disaster

South Africa’s only driving licence card printer has broken down 159 times in its 26 years of operation.

This is according to a recent statement from the Department of Transport, in which it announced that transport minister Barbara Creecy had requested help from the Auditor-General to probe a tender for South Africa’s new driver’s licence card.

Former Minister of Transport, Sindisiwe Chikunga, described the current driver’s licence card printer as “obsolete and prone to constant breakdown”, resulting in significant production backlogs.

“The card production machine has been in operation since 1998; thus, it’s obsolete and thus prone to constant breakdown,” Chikunga said in response to a Parliamentary question released on 14 June.

President Cyril Ramaphosa moved Chikunga to the Ministry of Youth, Women, and People with Disabilities when he appointed his new Cabinet at the end of June 2024. Creecy was appointed in her place.

The issue of South Africa’s ageing driving licence printing machine was first highlighted towards the end of 2021 when it broke down.

An electrical short reportedly damaged the machine after a building adjacent to its location was flooded.

It was only restored in January 2022, resulting in a backlog of around 639,000 cards.

Fikile Mbalula was the transport minister at the time. Chikunga replaced him when he was voted in as ANC Secretary-General in December 2022.

Since that two-month outage, the machine suffered several shorter breakdowns, resulting in further delays in issuing cards.

Another notable incident was in May 2023, when the Department of Transport issued a statement claiming that a breakdown was part of routine maintenance.

It said the routine maintenance started on 5 April and ended on 19 April 2023.

However, something broke during the process, requiring that the department order a critical part from the original equipment manufacturer in Germany.

The department did not divulge any details but said the machine would take several weeks to repair.

Chikunga and her predecessor, Fikile Mbalula, said that a permanent solution to the increasingly unreliable driver’s licence card printer was to get a new one.

However, it was not possible to buy the same type of printer South Africa was using, as it was the last remaining country in the world that still used the old technology.

Therefore, South Africa also had to adopt a new driving licence card.

Cabinet approved the plan in August 2022, and a tender was issued.

Since then, South Africans have been waiting for an announcement regarding the procurement of a new driving licence printing machine, with the ministers seesawing on a launch date.

Mbalula promised a pilot programme for the new cards would’ve been in full swing by the end of 2022. However, this never materialised.

It later emerged that the tender had been withdrawn and a new one issued in 2023.

Chikunga then said the tender for procuring a new machine was almost concluded in April 2024 and that it would start printing at the end of the month.

However, it was revealed in June that the Department of Transport had only then shortlisted five bidders and had yet to adjudicate the tender.

The department finally announced on Monday, 2 September 2024, that it had appointed a preferred bidder for the contract.

It selected Idemia Identity and Security South Africa to produce new driving licence cards for the country’s motorists.

This has stirred up controversy, as the Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) recently placed its chief information officer (CIO), Mthokozisi Mncwabe, on precautionary suspension over a project involving Idemia.

ACSA said a preliminary investigation unearthed indications of malfeasance surrounding the biometric and digital identity technology project involving its Automated Border Control project, e-gates, and single tokens.

The contract was valued at R115 million.

ACSA explained that the contract required at least 30% black ownership and that Idemia had a teaming agreement with local company InfoVerge as its partner.

The airport operator said it became aware of an impasse between Idemia and InfoVerge and engaged with both to try to reach an amicable resolution.

Initially, ACSA was satisfied the companies would work together to deliver the required services. However, the dispute became acrimonious.

“This resulted in InfoVerge approaching the Gauteng High Court, seeking relief to set aside ACSA’s decision to award the tender for the provision of Automated Border Control project to Idemia,” it said.

Idemia said it was unfortunate that ACSA decided to cancel the contract, adding that it remained optimistic about the future.

“We acknowledge and respect ACSA’s decision to terminate the contract for the biometric and digital identity technology project at South African airports,” Idemia said.

“We look forward to the opportunity to participate in ACSA’s re-procurement process.”

Following the outcry over Idemia’s appointment on the driver’s licence card tender, Creecy announced that she had requested the Auditor-General to widen the scope of its audit that was already being conducted on the process.

“The Auditor-General has been requested to prioritise this audit process given the current backlog for driving license card applications and the parlous state of the current printing machine,” Creecy said.