Sue Grobbelaar

Sue Grobbelaar currently holds the position of Deputy Director Admin: Motor Licencing Bureau.

Sue has worked her way up the ranks since commencing in the Department in 1973 at the Motor Licencing Bureau. She is a Leo, married to Albert, and her babies are her four Rottweilers. She enjoys restoring vehicles (like her beach buggie), interior decorating, gardening and to relax she enjoys visiting game reserves and bird watching.

Here she gives a personal account of her career in the Department, which spans 30 years.

I was appointed as a clerk in the Motor Licensing Bureau, on 11 June 1973. In those years the Bureau formed part of the Law Administration Division (LAD), which in turn formed part of the "then" Finance Branch.

In those days, there were different appointment requirements for women as opposed to men. It was a requirement, for all women, during those years, no matter whether you were matriculated or had a tertiary qualification, to work as a registry clerk, for at least one year. I must admit it certainly assisted me in getting to know the business.

Although not the norm, I was within 9 months transferred to the Public Counters, then situated within the Natalia Building. As a cashier I thoroughly enjoyed my work and the public contact certainly did it for me.

During the 1970’s and 1990’s MLB was responsible for the updating and Data capturing of all vehicle information within the Province, and also dealt with all the correspondence related there to. To cater for this there were sections within the Bureau that dealt with the different towns e.g. Harding (NA) Bergville (NB) Camperdown (NC), etc.

During the early 80’s (I remember because we were permitted to view Lady Di’s wedding on TV) I was called to the AD’s office and advised that I was going to be given an opportunity to supervise the Pinetown Section, which was situated on the 16^th floor of the Natalia Building. I jumped at the opportunity as very few women were, in those days, given such opportunities. I was only there one month when we had our first Fire Drill, believe you me, 16 floors is a long way down in 3 minutes! No wonder this youngster was placed in the furtherest office on the 16^th floor! Soon after the Fire Drill I commenced searching for alternative office accommodation. It was counter-productive for the Pinetown Section to operate from the 16^th floor when the rest of MLB, including the registry, were situated on the ground floor of the building.

Having, within 6 months succeeded in not only securing accommodation on the ground floor, and moving the section, but also getting my team to reduce the sections backlog from 6 months to 2 weeks, I was again called to the AD’s office and advised that the Public Counter Supervisor was due for retirement and that I had to take over the said functions. (No consultation, just another instruction!)

I rejoined the Public Counter Team and together we went from a manual cash register system to a stand-alone computer system. During this period I met more auditors in my life than Bank Managers, everybody wanted to prove that computer records were not "safe" and wanted a reason to revert back to manual record keeping, this included my management at the time. We at the MLB Pietermaritzburg Public Counter were determined not to revert back to manual records and assisted the IT guys as best we could and ensured that we catered for all the Treasury requirements in terms of Financial and Archive matters.

During this period we also changed from the erstwhile Road Traffic Ordinance, No 21 of 1966 to the Road Traffic Act, Act 29 of 1989 and all hell broke loose as certain of the Administrators functions, such as, the increasing of licence fees were taken away from the then Administrator. License fees could only be increased at a National level, not to mention the fact that all provinces had different fee structures for different category vehicles for example Natal charged R8.00 licence fees for a tractor whereas the OFS exempted all tractors.

MLB nevertheless survived all the changes including having to "right size", as we were placed on an incentive bonus system whereby less staff had to perform double the amount of work whilst being remunerated therefore, MLB lost almost half its personnel. All persons of a certain age well as all persons on probation had to leave the service by a certain date. The remainder had to carry the load, and we did but it was a swim or sink situation. Luckily I kept on swimming.

During these challenging years, I succeeded in being promoted to a Chief Admin Clerk and some years later to an Admin Officer.

MLB became part of the then Roads Department during the early 90’s. The entire management changed and I was again called to meet with the Deputy Director (DD) Admin and advised that my post was required in order to accommodate a person who will be dealing with the devolution of Motor Vehicle Registration and Licensing, functions and that I would be transferred to the Roads Department General Section, where I would be dealing with all administrative functions pertaining to Traffic matters. I once again had no say in the matter!

Shortly after joining the Roads Head Office I was transferred to the Road Traffic Inspectorate where I continued with Traffic matters. I spent many months revising the legislation which today, is in place within the existing National Road Traffic Act, Act 93 of 1996. I spent almost 5 years with the Road Traffic Inspectorate, and in 1995 applied for a post back at MLB, and was subsequently promoted to Senior Admin Officer at the MLB Legislation, Devolution and Policy section. On rejoining the MLB I realized how important it was that they too should be educated in Traffic matters specifically if one considers the fact that MLB gives "life" to the very vehicle that becomes a killer if not "street legal" (roadworthy).

My return to MLB in 1995, was welcomed, especially at a time when they were undergoing a drastic transformation, in terms of not only the Management Structure but their Service Delivery, as a whole. It was, therefore not difficult to change the mindset of people who were already so devoted to ensuring that only roadworthy vehicles were licensed in KZN. Together we have eliminated syndicates corrupt staff members, and the industry who are / were exploiting the disadvantaged and enriching themselves at the cost of the lives of others.

Today as Deputy Director Admin (MLB) I am not sorry that I accepted any of the challenges I was faced with in my career as it has assisted me tremendously in getting to know the business, from the bottom. I have been in a position to, inter alia, train a vast number of officials including senior management at Provincial and National level, and at the end of the day it all leads to one issue - Service Delivery ensuring safe vehicles on the roads and therefore the saving of lives.

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