Good day Mr Cwele,

I have been to 5 different home affairs departments. I have waited in long queues. I have arrived as early as 6 o'clock and waited for 4 hours each time. I have been extremely patient waiting for people who have not been assisted the previous day due to the department closing at 15:30 to be assisted before the present day queue can assisted. I finally gave up and applied online and made payment. However I could not get a booking through the bank as they only allow a certain number of applicants to go do their biometrics. Because of the urgency of needing my passport I had no choice but to choose to come to the department again after struggling to print my application forms because I didnt have the lasted Adobe Reader, I had to ask relatives of mine to assist me disclosing to them my ID, password etc. After finally printing the form I first went to the home affairs in Johannesburg CBD but the queue was long, so I raced through to Roodepoort to find the queue even longer, I decided to come to Krugersdorp as I heard that their queues weren't very long, only to find the queue leading out of the gates. I explained to the official that I have done everything online and just need to do my biometrics, but was disappointed when I was told that I have to stand in the long queue. I am here still waiting, the official came over about an hour ago telling everyone that the system is offline and that we should be patient to see if the system will automatically come back online. I have wasted time from work and standing in long queues, I have wasted petrol and energy. There are elderly people, mothers with babies and sickly people standing in this long queue waiting to get assistance. There was an Australian guy waiting in the line and explained that he has never in his life of travelling been to a country where the government service is so poor.

Mr. Minister some sort of actions needs to be taken or some sort of accommodation needs to be taken when queues are this long and the department can only assist people from 08:00 until 15:30.

Thank you