Pretoria - Earlier this morning, the Minister of Home Affairs, Naledi Pandor went to the University of Pretoria, Groenkloof Campus’s student residents to personally apologise on behalf of the Department of Home Affairs and handover the Identity Document to a student, Mr Bandile Ngidi, who had battled to get it for over two years.

Mr Ngidi (19) originally from Port Shepstone in KwaZulu-Natal is a student at the University of Pretoria, studying teaching on a government bursary.  Apparently, the University had threatened to deregister him for failing to produce the Identity Document. This would have also meant losing his bursary.

Upon reading his story in a newspaper, Minister Pandor instructed her Department to produce Mr Ngidi’s Identity Document within a week.  It took the Department less than 72 hours to produce the Identity Document; hence Minister was able to deliver it this morning.

Minister Pandor apologised to Mr Ngidi that his ID took long and wished him luck with his studies.  Minister promised to follow-up with the Department on why Mr Ngidi’s ID took over two years to produce.

A visibly elated Mr Ngidi could not wait to start his new life with an ID.

“I’m happy now because all my problems have been solved.  I can now study well. I did not even have a bank card and could not compete at the SA championships for athletes because of this Identity Document,” he explained.

Issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs