National Road Traffic Act

The following is a transcript of the proclamation which was published in Government Gazette 21425 of 31 July 2000. Section 80A was inserted by a correction in Government Gazette 21504 of 1 September 2000, GN R851.

PROCLAMATION
by the
President of the Republic of South Africa

No. R. 46, 2000

NATIONAL ROAD TRAFFIC ACT, 1996 (ACT NO. 93 OF 1996): COMMENCEMENT OF CERTAIN SECTIONS

Under section 94 of the National Road Traffic Act, 1996 (Act No. 93 of 1996), I hereby fix 1 August 2000 as the date on which the said Act as a whole, except for those sections of the said Act mentioned in the Schedule hereto, shall come into operation.

Given under my Hand and the Seal of the Republic of South Africa at Pretoria on this twenty sixth day of July, Two thousand.

T. M . MBEKI
President
By order of the President-in-Cabinet

A. M. OMAR
Minister of the Cabinet

SCHEDULE

Sections not coming into
operation		 Description
The following definitions in
section 1:		 “by-law”;
“examiner for driving licences”;
“examiner of vehicles”;
“inspector of licences”;
“instructor”;
“peace officer”;
“registering authority”; and
“traffic officer”.
3 Appointment of registering authorities
3A Appointment of officers
3B Application for registration as inspector of licences, examiner of vehicles, examiner for driving licences or traffic officer
3C Registration and grading of officers
3D Minimum requirements for registration as inspector of licences, examiner of vehicles, examiner for driving licences and traffic officer
3E Suspension and cancellation of registration of officer
3F Powers and duties of inspector of licences
3G Powers and duties of examiner of vehicles
3H Powers and duties of examiner for driving licences
3I Powers and duties of traffic officer
3J Failure to comply with instruction or direction of inspector of licences, traffic officer, examiner of vehicles or peace officer
3K Impersonating authorised officer or peace officer or inducing any such officer to forsake his or her duty
3L Approval of training center (sic)
11 Appointment of inspectorate of driving licence testing centers (sic)
28 Instructor to be registered
28A Application for registration as instructor
28B Registration and grading of instructors
28C Suspension and cancellation of registration of instructor
41 Appointment of inspectorate of testing stations
51A Right of appeal to Shareholders Committee
51B Right of appeal to chief executive officer
54 Transportation of certain dangerous goods prohibited
55 Appointment of dangerous goods inspector or inspectorate
80A Power of local authority to make by-laws
90 Apportionment of fines

Since this proclamation was published, Sections 54 and 55 came into operation on 1 August 2001 by proclamation in Government Gazette 22544 of 1 August 2001 (see Government Notice R39 of 2001) and Section 90 was repealed by Government Gazette 19971 of 28 April 1999, Act 21 of 1999 with effect from 20 November 2010 (See Government Notice R61 of 2010).

Effectively, this means that 23 sections of the National Road Traffic Act, 1996 are still not in force and are hence, administered by the Road Traffic Act, 1989 which has been repealed in its entirety.

Where to get copies of legislation.

Free resources

All of the above national legislation is available at the SA Government website, however, we must warn you that since legislation is often amended, what you get from that website can be very outdated and piecing the various amendments together can be a laborious task.

For provincial legislation and municipal bylaws, you will need to consult the website of the appropriate provincial government or local municipality.

Commercial resources

Your task could be made a lot easier by using one of the commercial enterprises that provide consolidated versions of legislation, amongst whom are:

The services above vary in just how up to date they are with the currently applicable legislation, but share one thing in common. None of them are what could be described as cheap.