Within the framework of the Ministry of Interior’s tendency to find radical solutions to eliminate traffic jams in the country, security sources said there is a tendency to withdraw thousands of ‘expired’ driving licenses from expatriates who continue to use them in violation of the law.
The sources told Al-Rai that many of these expats “circumvent the law and continue to use the expired licenses, because they are fully aware that if they are caught driving with an expired licence, the fine is just five dinars.
This is because according to the law they are treated as people who have license, but it has expired, while in fact the purpose for which these licences were granted has ended and therefore these expatriates treated as driving without licence and punished with deportation and not escape with a monetary fine.
The sources said “there are about 20,000 driving licenses granted to university students, most of them finished their studies and did not take the initiative to hand over the licenses.
They continue to drive with expired driving licences and all that the General Traffic Department has done is blocked them for not renewing them, and there are about 40,000 expatriates who also obtained licenses that were linked to their profession, and after the change in profession they should have surrendered these licences but they did not.
The sources added the General Traffic Department has linked the issue with the Public Authority for Manpower and Residence Affairs Authority, so any expatriate who holds a driving license can renew the residence permit only after it is ascertained that no ‘block’ has been placed against him/her in the (traffic system), and if there is (the block), the person is obliged to hand over the expired license so that the residence permit can be renewed.
In an additional step in the context of reviewing the files of those who were previously granted driving licenses to ensure that they conform to the conditions under which they were issued the sources said “a circular will be issued soon prohibiting driving the vehicle with the old license even if it is validity and therefore the holder must replace it with the new one, in order to keep in check counterfeiters who obtained driving licenses illegally or the purpose for which the driving licences were issued no longer exist.
The Undersecretary of the Ministry of Interior, Sheikh Faisal Al-Nawaf, had recently requested a study to stop issuing or legalize the issuance of driving licenses to residents, and/or put in place a new mechanism for granting the licenses.
