The Democratic Alliance (DA) has called for the Minister of Transport, to also extend the grace period for car licence disk renewals.

The DA expressed its concern over the “reckless and unnecessary fiasco” caused by the Minister of Transport, Fikile Mbalula and his department’s decision not to extend the grace period.

“On Saturday, 9 January, the Department of Transport released a statement confirming that, whilst extending the validity of all learners licenses, driving licence cards, temporary driving licence cards and professional driving permits (that had expired between 26 March and 31 December 2020) until 31st of August 2021, this extended grace period did not include vehicle licences or licence disks.

“By so doing, Mbalula has recklessly disregarded the call by President Ramaphosa to South Africans to avoid any sort of unnecessary gathering, such as ridiculously long queues at licencing offices and post offices across South Africa in order to comply with a completely inane and unnecessary regulatory oversight from the Transport department. If it is so necessary for government to prohibit South Africans from accessing beaches, and enforcing strict curfew times, they should at the very least, meet citizens halfway and provide them with relief through other measures,” the DA said

The Madibeng municipality announced this week that Brits licencing office will only assist a limited number of customers in an effort to curb the spread of COVID -19. Soon after, both offices in Hartbeespoort and Brits were closed due to COVVID-19 cases.