Digital Drive Hits a Dead End for Most South African Motorists

Digital Frustration: Most SA Motorists Still Can’t Book Licences Online

Just Two Provinces Get Online Access, The Rest Left Behind

Three years after South Africa’s much-anticipated Natis online booking system launched, drivers in seven of the country’s nine provinces are still left queuing at their local licensing departments. The digital service, meant to modernize and streamline driving licence applications, remains functional only in Gauteng and the Eastern Cape.

For the rest of the country, it’s as if the internet age never arrived.

Motorists in the Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Northern Cape, Western Cape, and most recently, the North West, are locked out of the system altogether. Even the North West, which briefly joined the digital fold, has inexplicably gone offline, without explanation.

When selecting one of these provinces on the eNatis platform, motorists are greeted with a frustrating message:
“Your Province has not been added to the online platform.”

What’s Holding It Back?

While many may assume this is a technical issue, the real reason lies in provincial decision-making.

According to Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) spokesperson Simon Zwane, the system is ready to roll , but the provinces themselves need to opt in. “We’ve made the platform available,” Zwane said, “and we’ll deploy it as soon as the provinces are ready.”

That readiness, however, seems indefinitely stalled.

In the Western Cape, for example, transport officials want to implement their own “smart enrolment devices” first, citing concerns about the bumpy rollout in Gauteng. The province says it will only consider integrating Natis in the 2025/26 financial year, a full five years after the system launched.

A Print Crisis Piles On

Even for motorists in Gauteng and the Eastern Cape who can use Natis, there’s more bad news: the actual printing of driving licence cards has become a national crisis.

South Africa’s one and only licence card printer, an aging, failure-prone relic, broke down in February 2025. It only returned to operation in May, by which time the backlog had exploded to over 747,000 cards.

Transport Minister Barbara Creecy said in May the backlog was at 733,000. By mid-June, the department claimed that number had shrunk to 690,000. At the current rate of processing about 2,400 cards per day, it could take more than a year to clear.

Broken Machines, Broken Trust

The government had plans to upgrade the outdated printer. In August 2024, Idemia South Africa was named the preferred bidder for the new machines. But civil society watchdog OUTA flagged tender irregularities, prompting the Auditor-General to launch an investigation.

Now, the Department of Transport has taken the matter to court, asking the Pretoria High Court to scrap the contract entirely. In the meantime, a temporary deal with the Government Printing Works is expected to serve as a stopgap solution — but not a permanent fix.

A Digital Divide With Real Consequences

While South Africa has long aspired to bring services online, the Natis system is a sobering example of how uneven implementation can leave most of the country behind. The result? Long queues, angry motorists, and a growing sense of digital exclusion.

For now, motorists outside Gauteng and the Eastern Cape remain in limbo, stuck with old-school queues, unreliable systems, and little faith that help is coming anytime soon.

And for those already lucky enough to book online, they still face the maddening reality of having to wait months for a simple piece of plastic.

The road to digital progress, it seems, is full of potholes.

{Source: My Broad Band}

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