Civilian Control and Participation in Safety
Civilian Oversight and participation in the delivery of safety , transport, traffic and integrated road infrastructure services is a bold statement on the part of the Department to emphasize its responsiveness to community expectations and respect for their socio-economic rights. For instance Police accountability continues to be prioritized in an effort to protect the fundamental rights of all community members and to strengthen remedies when individuals charged with the responsibility to fairly and equitably promote the ends of the law (such as the police, magistrates, judges, correctional officer, tec.) violate these rights. Because civilian oversight is a vital part of democratic policing collaboration between the community and the police becomes an indispensable element of the – Kena Le Matla campaign.
Social Crime Prevention
Our national goal for a democratic and just South Africa has always been shaped around the liberation of and respect for women and children. Accordingly, the role of the department is to participate in the national efforts to build a caring society free from all forms of violence including domestic violence. It is important to mention that the sad contribution of alcohol and drug abuse in the perpetrating effect of crime – particularly domestic violence and sexual offences in the Free State Province – is far from resembling a caring nation.
Rural Community Safety
It is important to indicate that the Free State Province prides itself as the bread basket of South Africa. Accordingly, the issue of safety and security for the farmers and rural poor is of utmost importance. Given the challenges of crime affecting this sector of our society, the Department felt that the creation of a multi-stakeholder platform that will continuously seek to find a sustainable solution to crime and human rights violations that afflict rural communities – especially in the farming areas and along the Free State-Lesotho border remains the priority of the Department .
Road Safety
Statistics show that during the 2007/8 financial year the Department through its Arrive Alive campaign managed to reduce road accidents by 9%. While this is welcomed it is important to note that incidents of reckless driving, driving under the influence of liquor, driving unroadworthy vehicles, etc, are still unacceptably high. Accordingly, the Department will be strengthening its capacity to mount an effective all-year-round Arrive Alive campaign aimed at ensuring that the Free State’s roads are safe. The strategies to be embarked upon will, amongst others, include massive public education programmes aimed at educating road users, pedestrians and the broader society about the importance of respecting rules of the road.
Taxi Recapitalisation Programme
Following the launch of the scrapping of vehicles on 28 October 2006 in Botshabelo, to date 6763 applications of the 9836 received for the conversion of public permits to operating licenses were processed and approved by the Operating Licensing Board in the Free State. In total 1356 (13.8% of 9836) taxi vehicles have been scrapped to date and 1422 (14.5% of 9836) operators were paid the R50 000 taxi scrapping allowance by the Department amounting to a total of R71.1m. The outstanding 66 vehicles will be scrapped shortly.
Roads Infrastructure
The preliminary design and detail of the road construction projects are in different stages of the completion. Due to unforeseen rise and escalation in construction costs several of the projects that were set aside towards the massification of the Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) were redesigned on a scaled down approach to stay within the allocated budgets.
Fleet Management
The fleet management unit has undertaken to purchase at least 300 new vehicles in the 2009/10 financial year. Based on above-mentioned parameters, 231 vehicles have already been ordered. By the end of November 2008, 14 non-departmental services were completed since April 2008 while are still running. This includes three full earth-moving services, two equipment hire services and nine indirect support services to municipalities via the EPWP programme.
Land Passenger Transport
The Department will work with the Mangaung Local Municipality in the construction of the Intermodal Facility that integrates bus, taxi and rail services. The same cooperation will extend to the construction of the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) in the Mangaung area. Notwithstanding the fact that these projects will not be ready for the 2010 soccer spectacular, they will however be an important milestone in enhancing the integrated transport services and infrastructure development.
Vehicle – Licensing and Registration
- Certificate of Registration
- Traffic Register Number Certificate
- Road Worthy Test Certificate
- Application for Registration and Licensing of Motor Vehicle – RLV (blue form)
- Notification of Change of Ownership/Sale of Motor Vehicle – NCO (yellow form)
Drivers – Licensing, permits and certificates
- Professional Driving Permit Applications
- Driving Licences
- Learner’s Licence Applications
- Driving Instructor’s Certificate Applications
- Application for Temporary Operating Licence
- Driving Licence Testing Centre Registration