The Department of Transport will lodge a High Court application for a declaratory order seeking guidance on how to proceed after a driving licence card machines tender was found to have been irregular by the Auditor-General South Africa (AGSA).

Transport Minister Barbara Creecy has also released the executive summary of the AGSA audit report confirming that the winning bidder, IDEMIA, failed to meet key bid technical requirements.

In addition, prescribed supply chain management processes had not been implemented during the tender by the Driving Licence Card Account (DLCA), the department’s agency set up to produce and deliver secure driving licences.

Creecy requested the AGSA to audit allegations of tender process manipulation in September, attaching a letter from the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA), in which specific allegations of irregular procurement were made.

OUTA welcomed the announcement by Creecy, stating that it could save taxpayers millions in light of evidence it had collected showing that the contract value had ballooned from the DLCA’s budgeted R486-million to above R898-million.

In fact, the AGSA audit showed that all bids submitted exceeded the R486-million budget, pointing to inadequate market analysis and the use of outdated pre-Covid prices.

“This outcome is the direct result of effective civil intervention, when civil society organisations work responsibly with whistleblowers to build strong evidence-based cases that halt grossly overpriced, and what is clearly a corrupt, tender from being awarded.

“We also hope that those involved in the bid evaluation and adjudication process will be held accountable,” OUTA CEO Wayne Duvenage said in a statement.

Given the aged nature of the current driving licence machine, which had also been prone to breakdowns, Creecy said the department was exploring various interim solutions to sustain the operations of the current  machine.

These interim measures would be announced in due course, she added.