Dr Aaron Motsoaledi Justifies Passport Hikes, Says Government Was “Heavily Subsidising” Holders

• Minister of Home Affairs Dr Aaron Motsoaledi has justified the price hikes for South African passports
• The minister said it was found that South Africa’s tariffs were almost three times lower than other countries
• Motsoaledi said that government is “heavily subsidising” passport holders who are better financially

JOHANNESBURG - Minister of Home Affairs Dr Aaron Motsoaledi said the price hikes for passports and travel documents were decided following a benchmarking exercise.

In a statement released by the Home Affairs Department, South Africa’s tariffs were almost three times lower than other countries.

Motsoaledi said that the production costs are much higher than the price of passports and that government is “heavily subsidising” passport holders.

The minister said people who could travel outside the country were financially better than ordinary citizens and did not need to be subsidised.

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According to TimesLIVE, the fees will increase on Tuesday, 1 November, for 32-page adult passports, child passports, documents for travel purposes, and crew member certificates.

The fees for applications outside South Africa are for adult and child passports.

If a document is lost or damaged, passport replacements will cost double the standard issue fee under the new fee structure, EWN reported.

South Africans react to the price increase:

@Jonathan__1984 said:

“It’s not about being financially better than the ordinary citizen, some need their passport to travel for work. So that they can feed their families.”

@GenduToit commented:

“Why can we not fight this? We get screwed from all sides honestly.”

@in_the_mix21 posted:

“Someone has to fund corruption. Why not the working-class south African?”

Passport prices to increase in November, Mzansi says “Who comes up with these crazy prices?”

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In a related matter, Briefly News also reported Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi noted that the application fee for some South African passports would double next month. The notice was Gazetted on Thursday, 6 October.

The fee for a standard passport for adults and children will increase to R600 from the initial price of R400 that took effect in 2011. Frequent travellers will have to cough up R1200 for a 48-page passport.

The bigger passports previously had a 50% premium that was in line with its additional page number.

Source: Briefly News