Home Affairs minister Naledi Pandor today announced that pensioners will be receiving their first smart ID cards free of charge.
Addressing the media at a briefing in Pretoria, Pandor said the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) has reached an agreement with National Treasury that the R140 smart ID card application fee will be waived for pensioners aged 60 and older.
Last month, the Democratic Alliance (DA) slammed Pandor for being "arrogant and out-of-touch" by expecting poor South Africans to pay R140 to apply for a new smart ID card. DA shadow minister of home affairs Manny de Freitas said that the smart ID fee poses a serious threat to the poor's financial security, as R140 is "literally the difference between survival and starvation" for millions of South Africans.
DHA has confirmed that the implementation of the smart ID card for all citizens will cost taxpayers R5.3 billion.
The cards will be issued free to 16-year-olds who are first-time applicants, while all other applicants will be expected to pay R140.
Pandor also announced this morning that smart ID cards will soon be rolled out to citizens with disabilities in recognition of November being earmarked as the month of the disabled. "As part of this designation, the DHA will issue smart ID cards to some of our citizens with disabilities, during the week of the 18 to 22 November, in and around Cape Town, Johannesburg and Pretoria," says Pandor.
The smart ID card was officially launched in July with the handover of former president Nelson Mandela's card. Government has lauded the security of the card since its inception, calling it "almost impossible to fabricate".
In October, SA won an award for the best designed smart ID card for 2013 during the Asia, Middle East and Africa High Security Printing conference, held in Bangkok, says Pandor.
Roll-out of the smart IDs will take six to eight years to complete.