‘No excuses’ for drivers without licences
YESTERDAY marked the end of the grace period for motorists whose driving licences expired between March 2020 and August 2021 to have them renewed.
Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) CEO Wayne Duvenage advised people to challenge fines for expired licences.
“We advise people to challenge their fines received for an expired licence, if they can demonstrate that they have attempted on a few occasions to have their licence renewed, but could not do so because either they will have screenshots of the online booking system being down, or rejecting their booking attempts, etc, or photos/videos of long queues and inability to get into a centre to book their renewal, etc.”
Duvenage said if the government processes and systems had made it unreasonably difficult for people to have their licences renewed, a judge would be hard pressed to find someone guilty of an offence and hopefully the fine and charge would be overturned.
The Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) yesterday said driving licence centres in the majority of provinces were operating at extended hours of service to assist motorists who wished to renew their documents.
RTMC spokesperson Simon Zwane said motorists who had missed the deadline were advised to obtain temporary driving licences.
“Motorists are warned that law enforcement agencies will from this week go out to strictly apply the law against those with expired driving licences,” Zwane said.
He said no excuses would be entertained if motorists missed the deadline.
“No excuses will be entertained as the government has extended the validity period for these documents on numerous occasions and implemented extensive measures to assist motorists who wish to comply.
“Driving with expired driving licence cards will also have negative consequences in case of collisions as insurance companies may decline claims made by drivers who failed to renew their cards,” Zwane said.
He said the backlog of driving licence cards that had not been renewed stood at 1.3 million at the beginning of May with the majority of non-renewals (68%) being in the group aged between 25 and 50 years.
Zwane said those who had already renewed and wished to know if their licence cards had been printed were advised to forward their identity numbers to the following number – 33214 – via SMS to establish this.
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula last week said the department would not extend the grace period.