Govt stats show eNatis success

By Leon Engelbrecht, ITWeb senior writer

Johannesburg, 10 May 2007

The official eNatis Web site is this morning making bold claims about the post-upgrade efficiency of the transport department's electronic National Traffic Information System (eNatis).

eNatis was deployed on 13 April, but capacity constraints condemned it to a cold reception from an increasingly irate public. This past weekend, the developers effectively doubled the system's server capacity - and the Web site says this has done the trick. The figures given below have not been independently verified.

"Before the interventions, an average 400 000 transactions were performed per day on the eNatis. After the interventions, 598 000 and 687 000 transactions were performed on 8 May and 9 May respectively," a posting on the site says. "A 100% availability has been achieved and the system has not been down at any stage.

"A lot of month-end procedures were performed by service centres and the eNatis handled the additional load well and all system components operated in a very stable manner," it adds.

"In respect of motor vehicle registrations, an average of 13 500 registrations per day were performed on the old Natis system... Before the interventions, eNatis perform an average of 11 000 motor vehicle registrations per day. After the interventions, 14 000 and 17 000 registrations were performed on 8 and 9 May, respectively.

Apology

"A similar trend was identified with vehicle licensing transactions. The old Natis system performed an average of 33 000 vehicle licensing transactions per day since January 2007. The eNatis performed an average of 25 500 per day before interventions, while 42 421 and 50 045 vehicle licensing transactions were performed on 8 and 9 May 2007, respectively," the posting on the site says.

Transport minister Jeff Radebe on Tuesday apologised to South Africans for the eNatis problems. "The Department of Transport, the contractor and myself unreservedly apologise for the inconvenience caused. [But] I am confident the benefits of such interventions (eNatis) outweigh the inconvenience."

He was, however, adamant that the implementation was not a "monumental mess", as put to him by a journalist. The system has been plagued by operational problems since its launch on 13 April.

The Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) will take over the running of eNatis on 1 June, provided it is performing to specification.