AA flags appointment of French firm to make new SA smart driving licence

The September 1 announcement by the department of transport (DoT) on the appointment of French technology company IDEMIA Identity and Security as the preferred bidder to produce new smart driving licence cards for South Africa has raised more questions than answers in relation to the process.

The Automobile Association (AA) said it was incumbent on the department to answer these questions or face continued criticism and scepticism of the process.

“In mid-June we posed several questions to the DoT in relation to this process, but we have so far not received any response. Among the questions we asked were the level of involvement, if any, by the Government Printing Works (GPW) in the process of drafting and evaluating bidders, and why the GPW had not been considered the sole provider of this service given that they perform government’s security printing function,” the AA said.

It said the value of the contract, the time frames for the rollout of the new smart cards and the reason IDEMIA was selected needed to be made public. 

“This also raises questions as to why the other four bidders were not appointed. Surely the public has the right to know how this project is unfolding, but the lack of clarity in the appointment of the preferred bidder — including the apparent secrecy with which the tender was issued — raises concerns.

“Similarly in mid-June the department noted that it is ‘on track to deliver new driver’s licence card and printing equipment for the country amid initial challenges of finding suitable service provider/s’, yet we still don’t know what these ‘challenges’ are, or how they affected the finalisation of IDEMIA as the preferred bidder.”

Despite these questions, the more pertinent issue remained the need for a physical driver’s licence card in the first place, the AA said.

“We have seen the digitisation of many functions in both the private and public sector — the functioning of the SA Revenue Service is a good example. We must question why the digitisation of licence cards is not top of the agenda at the DoT. The ability to manage driving licences through fingerprints would, in our view, be more appropriate and more secure, especially given the rate of forgery of physical cards.”

The AA said it plans to raise questions on the appointment of IDEMIA through formal communication with the parliamentary standing committee on transport, as well as with other bodies such as the standing committee on public accounts (Scopa) and the auditor-general.

The association noted the appointment of IDEMIA followed the announcement less than a week ago by Airports Company South Africa (Acsa) to terminate a contract with IDEMIA for automated border control. In its statement announcing the termination of the contract last Tuesday, Acsa noted said “[it] remains committed to the best interests of good corporate governance, transparency, and fairness as [it] continues with an independent investigation”.

That investigation concerns the way the contract with IDEMIA was concluded. 

“Huge amounts of public funds are at play in this process and the public, justifiably, has a right to understand to whom this money will be paid and how it will be allocated. By not taking citizens into their confidence on this important matter, the DoT are effectively laying the groundwork for accusations of impropriety in the allocation of funds — accusations which will taint the process from its inception,” the AA said.