People queue at the Vehicle Registration Center in September 2023. (Credit: Mohammed Yassin)
BEIRUT — Lebanon's Interior Ministry announced on Friday that driving licenses that expired after Dec. 31., 2023, will continue to be valid until Jun. 30, 2024.
"As a result of the failure to resume work in some branches of the vehicle registration centers, [known as the Nafaa], private and public market licenses that expired after Dec. 31, 2023 will continue to be valid until June. 30, 2023", reads a statement issued by the Interior Ministry.
Legally, driver's licenses in Lebanon are valid for only 10 years. However, the Interior Ministry has repeatedly extended the expiry dates on driving licenses in recent years due to the fact that Nafaa centers have frequently been closed since the onset of the country's economic crisis in 2019.
Although the closure of these centers is partly due to the crisis, there are other contributing factors.
There is an ongoing investigation into alleged corruption on the part of Nafaa employees, which has led to large-scale arrests of staff members. A dispute between the Traffic Management Center and Inkript, a company specialized in IT security for governments and financial institutions, has also disrupted the provision of services. At the beginning of last September, the Nafaa reopened, but at limited capacity, after a week of negotiations between the two parties.