Transport minister Fikile Mbalula has warned of the fast-approaching grace period deadline for motoring licences in South Africa at the end of March.<\/p>\n
The national lockdown imposed on the country last year forced licencing centres to close, resulting in a massive backlog of expired licences. This was compounded after the country’s only licence printing machine broke down at the end of 2021,\u00a0leaving approximately half a million South African motorists stuck with expired driving licence cards.<\/p>\n
Mbalula previously extended expired licences to 31 March 2022 due to delays caused by the Covid-19 pandemic which meant motorists could not visit licensing centres. This grace period covered all documents which expired in the period between 26 March 2020 and 31 August 2021.<\/p>\n
“We think by April we would have been done with a backlog of around two million people it will take us somewhere,” he told eNCA.<\/p>\n
“It’s not on our agenda to extend<\/strong> (the grace period) hence my call to all people, go and renew your driver’s license, and be on the queue to renew your driver’s license card.<\/p>\n Mbalula added that the country’s licence printing machine was now back in operation and several new online features will make it easier to get a licence.<\/p>\n “My call to all people is to go and renew your driver licence and be in the queue – there will never be another window. We are going (back) to normal now as we were before Covid.<\/p>\n “Once the (state of disaster) is gone away with we should be ready to roll with the country’s driver licence backlog.”<\/p>\n