Wednesday, 11 March 2026

The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) notes the decision by the Department of Home Affairs to roll out new identity document services through selected commercial banks under what it calls “Home Affairs @Home.” While the department claims this initiative will reduce queues and improve efficiency, the EFF warns that this programme represents a dangerous step in the privatisation of the infrastructure of citizenship in South Africa.

The EFF is deeply concerned that the Democratic Alliance (DA), through its control of the Department of Home Affairs, is choosing to hand over core state responsibilities to private financial institutions instead of rebuilding the capacity of the state itself. Identity documentation is not a luxury service or commercial product; it is the legal foundation of citizenship, determining whether a person can vote, work, access social grants, open bank accounts, or participate in the economic life of the country.

This policy shift comes at a time when the Department of Home Affairs is already failing millions of people. According to the department itself, more than 4.4 million South Africans aged 16 and older do not have identity documents, leaving them excluded from basic civic and economic rights. In addition, the crisis of documentation in South Africa runs far deeper. Statistics show that around 11% of people in the country, approximately six million individuals, lack formal documentation of any kind, including birth certificates and identity documents. This has left them effectively stateless within their own country and unable to access education, healthcare, or social grants.

Instead of addressing this crisis by investing in new Home Affairs offices, hiring additional staff, and modernising state infrastructure, the DA’s answer is to outsource identity services to banks further enriching their counterparts through state coffers. This approach entrenches inequality because it assumes that access to citizenship should be mediated through the private banking system.

The majority of poor and working-class South Africans, particularly those in rural communities, townships, and informal settlements, do not have easy access to bank branches or do not participate fully in the formal banking system.

Even more concerning is that this policy is being implemented in a context where corruption within Home Affairs is already a serious national security threat. For years, syndicates have been exposed for selling fraudulent identity documents, manipulating immigration systems, and colluding with officials to produce illegal documentation. By inserting private banking institutions into the home affairs chain, the DA risks creating new vulnerabilities due to commercial interests, and the resultant data management issues that will arise.

Banks themselves are not immune to corruption, fraud, or data breaches. The integration of private financial institutions into the core systems of identity registration raises serious questions about the security of citizens’ personal data and the potential for collusion between corrupt officials and private actors. If the DA was serious about solving the crisis of documentation in South Africa, it would prioritise the massive expansion and modernisation of Home Affairs offices across the country; the deployment of live-capture technology in every Home Affairs branch; eradication of corruption syndicates operating within the department; as well as mobile documentation units for rural and underserved communities.

Instead, the DA continues to advance a neoliberal agenda that weakens the state and strengthens private corporations, gradually transforming public services into commercialised platforms controlled by banks and large corporations. Once again, South Africa cannot build a capable developmental state by hollowing out public institutions and outsourcing their constitutional duties to private entities. The infrastructure of citizenship must remain firmly under democratic state control and must be expanded to reach every community in the country.