The Home Affairs Department has a total of 377,060 identity numbers which remain blocked on the National Population Register.
The Home Affairs Department has blamed unserviceable addresses for its failure to trace nearly 400,000 people with blocked IDs since the Gauteng High Court found that the placing of markers against identity numbers without a fair administrative due process was unconstitutional and invalid.
The High Court had granted the department a window period of 12 months, from January 16, 2024, to March 1, 2025, to correctly reflect the particulars of the person to whom the identity number was assigned after determining the identity numbers against which markers had been placed.
The order had prompted the department to embark on a media campaign to provide the affected members of the public with an opportunity to make representations.
The move sought to address the long-standing issue of wrongfully blocked IDs while curtailing the prevalence of fraudulent documents in circulation.
