SA’S ONLY DRIVING LICENCE CARD MACHINE WORKING AGAIN

Good news for those waiting to get their driving licence cards renewed is that the country’s only machine able to print the cards is back up and running again.

The Department of Transport announced on Sunday that the machine was taken out of production for three weeks to replace a broken part that was identified during routine maintenance.

Once the parts were replaced, the testing of the machine took another two weeks before it got the two thumbs up to go back into full production.

After five weeks, the current backlog of cards is 350,000.

It’s estimated that now, with the machine working again, its production will be increased. During the two-week testing period, it was able to produce 60,000 cards per week. It will now be increased to 120,000 cards per week.

Department spokesperson Collen Msibi said the machine had printed an average of 2,850,000 cards per year over the past two financial years. Since its commissioning in 1998, it has printed over 60 million driving licence cards.

With the introduction of the new driving licence cards approved by cabinet in 2022, new card production machines will replace the current machine.

Image credit: The Mail & Guardian