eNaTIS will cost motorists a R30 fee

By Tarryn Le Chat
14 May 2007

Transport Minister Jeff Radebe needs to justify his decision to impose an additional cost of R30 on motorists and other users which will allegedly be used for the maintenance of the multimillion rand electronic National Traffic Information System (eNaTIS), says DA member of Parliament Stuart Farrow.

The fee was announced on Tuesday, 8 May, by the minister at a press conference in which he apologised for the disastrous launch of eNaTIS and said it was to take effect from the 1 July this year.

Accordign to a statement, it is estimated that Government will be coining a whopping R258 million a year from the additional fee on the country’s 8.6 million registered motor vehicle owners.

Farrow says, “The DA will, this week, submit a parliamentary question in order to ascertain why minister Radebe did not announce this fee at the launch of eNaTIS and whether his department has explored all other avenues to get the money for the maintenance of the system?”

The DA member continues saying that eNaTIS is fraught with problems and that the Tasima consortium – which won the R408 million contract in 2001 – is supposed to hand it over to the department at the end of this month, “one cannot help but wonder about the reasons that have prompted the Minister to impose this additional fee.”

Farrow, however, was unavailable for comment as he did not answer his cellphone.