Transport Committee Welcomes Concourt eNatis Ruling

By Republic of South Africa: The Parliament

The Portfolio Committee on Transport has welcomed today’s Constitutional Court ruling on the Electronic National Traffic Information System (eNatis) system matter involving the Department of Transport and the developers of the system, Tasima.

The Committee Chairperson, Ms Dikeledi Magadzi, said now the Department could move to the next phase, which is the national roll out of the system. “For too long, litigation after litigation held back the Department’s plans, thereby negatively impacting on the delivery of services to the people. The Committee is happy with the ruling, as the matter has proved to be a challenge for a number of years,” Ms Magadzi said.

“The understanding has always been that once the system was working it would be transferred to the Department as its rightful owners,” she said.

The Constitutional Court ruled today that Tasima must hand over the services and eNatis to the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) within 30 days. It also ruled that, unless an alternative transfer management plan is agreed to by the parties within 10 days of this order, the hand-over must to be conducted in terms of the migration plan.

Ms Magadzi said this was victory not only for the people of South Africa and the government, but also for service delivery. “The Constitutional Court has confirmed that the days of the government being unscrupulously held to ransom by private companies, which have been contracted to provide a service to it, are over. The parties must move to finalise all outstanding matters so that the system is implemented,” she said.