Another setback for digital driver’s licences in South Africa

The Driving Licence Card Account (DLCA) has revealed that it will still be a few years until South Africa gets a new physical driver’s licence permit and implements digital driving licences.

This comes from the organisation’s annual performance plan for 2025/26.

The DLCA is responsible for printing South Africa’s physical driving licenses and serves under the Department of Transport.

The South African government originally approved the new driving licence card design in August 2022, stating that the project would lay the foundation for digital driving licences accessible on mobile devices.

“The entity commenced with the process for the acquisition of the equipment and related infrastructure,” DLCA said in its annual performance plan.

“The new card project will allow the DLCA to adopt digital technologies that will enable the automation of processes and provide some agility with a focus on delivering services efficiently and promptly.”

However, the DLCA has yet to set any progress targets until the 2026/27 financial year, with it noting that it is targeting 25% new card implementation in 2026/27 and 75% implementation in 2027/28.

The DLCA additionally indicated that it wishes to position itself as the leading producer of security cards in South Africa, with its new production infrastructure providing the enhanced service delivery and production turnaround times needed to produce other types of cards.

Digital driving licences in SA

The first announcement about introducing digital driving licences came in the DLCA’s 2021/22 annual performance plan, and in March 2022, former transport minister Fikile Mbalula confirmed the government’s intention to implement electronic driving licences.

He indicated that the rollout of the electronic licences would follow the introduction of a new physical licence card, which he said, at the time, would be released in October 2023.

Mbalula also said that motorists would be able to choose between a physical or digital licence when renewing their documents in 2024/25 and onwards.

Neither of these claims has come to pass, and according to Driving.co.za managing director Rob Handfield-Jones, one of the reasons for this is that digital licences won’t make the government any more money.

He explained that there is no technological or practical obstacle to digital licensing and enforcement, and that the problem is the Road Traffic Management Corporation’s refusal to give up the revenue streams that go with analogue document production.

That said, digital driving licence systems are still relatively new, with only a few nations and regions worldwide adopting the technology.

The countries using digital licences have several variations on the system they use, with some using a proprietary app and QR code for the licence, and others allowing licences to be downloaded and stored in a digital mobile wallet like the Apple Wallet on iPhones.

Handfield-Jones noted that South Africa does have the infrastructure to support such systems.

For instance, the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) Act already requires that all traffic officers carry a digital terminal that can scan licence barcodes, including those shown on a smartphone screen, and most modern smartphones can scan WR codes.

“It’s nonsense, but the government has somehow been permitted to advance a narrative that a driving licence is different to almost every other official document,” he said.