A million still need licences
2003-03-20 22:44
Rajaa Azzakani
Johannesburg - Licencing officers required to process 1.1 million conversions for the new card format driver's licences before the end of next month were facing a huge workload compounding with every passing day as hardly any motorists applied for conversions.
Lisa Mangcu, manager for the road traffic management section at the transport ministry, said on Thursday only 1 815 people applied on Wednesday instead of the 42 000 who were required to apply daily to convert their old driver's licences. "It seems like a total boycott."
Mangcu said the 330 licencing offices country-wide needed to process 210 000 new licence applications a week in order to reach the target within the remaining 25 work days.
He said the target was within easy reach for the department since they were able to process 222 000 in the final week of February ahead of the first deadline.
He added that they received 4 235 applications country-wide on Monday, and only 1 908 on Tuesday.
Mangcu said Gauteng posed the biggest problem with 487 422 outstanding applications. Tshwane had 199 869 motorists who had failed to convert to the new card format driver's licences.
- Beeld