{"id":881114,"date":"2026-10-23T11:02:38","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T09:02:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=881114"},"modified":"2026-10-23T11:02:40","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T09:02:40","slug":"update-on-blocked-petrol-cards-for-officials-in-joburg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/881114\/update-on-blocked-petrol-cards-for-officials-in-joburg\/","title":{"rendered":"Update on blocked petrol cards for officials in Joburg"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Johannesburg Metro Police Department (JMPD) has confirmed that its fuel payment cards have been unblocked and are functioning as per usual, after reports of temporary blockages due to non-payment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earlier this week, reports emerged regarding a directive issued by the JMPD instructing officers to return police vehicles to their stations after their shifts, due to fuel supply shortages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The temporary blockage of the department’s fuel cards had reportedly prevented officers from refuelling police vehicles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, JMPD spokesperson Xolani Fihla announced that the fuel card administrative matters affecting the departmental vehicles have been fully resolved, and all cards are now unblocked and functioning normally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The temporary blockage was not an internal JMPD issue, but rather an administrative matter at the City level during a transitional arrangement between the City of Johannesburg and the service provider,” said Fihla.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fihla said that no operational activities or law enforcement deployments were affected or compromised during the transitional period that resulted in blocked fuel cards. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The situation was managed internally to ensure that visible policing and emergency responses continued without disruption,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He explained that standard fuel-saving measures, internal fleet controls, and vehicle monitoring remain in place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The spokesperson also confirmed that law enforcement operations are running smoothly across all areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Residents are reassured that JMPD officers remain on the ground continuously enforcing traffic regulations, municipal by-laws, and crime prevention measures,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“High-visibility patrols and targeted operations remain active across every part of the city, with a specialised focus on identified hot spots and key areas of concern.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said that every part of Johannesburg will continue to receive “relentless” law enforcement coverage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The pinnacle of service delivery failure”<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) CEO Wayne Duvenage<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Corruption-fighting civil action organisation Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) CEO Wayne Duvenage told Talk Radio 702<\/a> that an incident such as this is the pinnacle of service delivery failure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Duvenage described the incident, coupled with other service delivery failures, as the city coming to a grinding halt and failing to provide basic services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Duvenage said the directive issued to the officials told them not to use the vehicles for personal purposes and to leave them at their stations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He raised concerns about why police officials were not adhering to the policy requiring police vehicles to be used only for departmental matters, not for personal use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This abuse of state resources in a big city like Johannesburg, when it gets down to a situation where you’ve run out of money, the people start to suffer.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said that the city has reached a point where its security and road traffic management systems are failing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Duvenage said that with speed camera operations currently suspended and limited police visibility on the roads, incidents involving unlicensed and unroadworthy vehicles will increase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Johannesburg has gone 10 months without camera-based speed enforcement after the JMPD switched off the city’s speed cameras when its contract with the camera provider ended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In December 2025, Johannesburg’s three-year contract with Syntell, which provided the cameras and system used to process fines, had ended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the contract ended, the company took its cameras with it. Last month, JMPD spokesperson Xolani Fihla said that the tender process to replace the system was still underway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fihla said that officers who would have been deployed to monitor speed cameras have been redeployed to areas with high crime levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Enforcement operations were temporarily suspended, as access to back-end systems ended. The city is currently navigating the mandatory Municipal Finance Management Act procurement process to appoint a new service provider,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fuel payment cards for police officials have been unblocked, after a temporary blockage due to non-payment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":718396,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2113556807603912962","_sma_facebook_post_id":"191437357620492_2246360449517687","_sma_instagram_post_id":"17991173820077104","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26921,21329,22224],"class_list":["post-881114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-fuel-card-block","tag-johannesburg-metro-police-department-jmpd","tag-the-organisation-undoing-tax-abuse-outa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=881114"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":881189,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881114\/revisions\/881189"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/718396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=881114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=881114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=881114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}