Which vehicles were most popular with South Africa’s government buyers in August 2023? Let’s take a look at the cars and bakkies the state bought last month…

In August 2023, around 1.2% of South Africa’s new-vehicle sales total of 45 679 units represented purchases by government, according to industry representative body Naamsa. So, which vehicles were most popular with the state last month?

Well, we’ve combed through the sales figures to identify the new cars and bakkies bought by government in August (though we’ve excluded the handful of purchases in the medium- and heavy commercial vehicle segments). Note, too, that the BMW Group and Mercedes-Benz didn’t report detailed sales statistics, so these marques unfortunately can’t be included in this exercise.

The imported VW Polo Sedan placed 2nd on the list of best-sellers to government in August.

Fascinatingly, the vehicle most popular with government buyers last month was a bakkie. Yes, the state procured as many as 181 units of the Isuzu D-Max, representing around 11% of the Struandale-manufactured bakkie’s total of 1632 sales.

Next came the Indian-built Volkswagen Polo Sedan (67 units), followed by the Kariega-produced Volkswagen Polo Vivo (39 units). The government also acquired 35 units of the Prospecton-built Toyota Hilux – which was Mzansi’s best-selling vehicle in August with 3309 registrations – along with 33 examples of the Toyota Quantum.

The Rosslyn-manufactured Nissan Navara (19 units) was the final vehicle to crack double figures, with the Audi A4 (8 units), Nissan NP200 (8 units), Audi Q5 (5 units), Mahindra Pik-Up (5 units), Audi Q3 (4 units), Audi A3 Sedan (3 units), Ford Ranger (3 units), Volkswagen Golf 8 (3 units), Audi A1 Sportback (2 units), Volkswagen Polo hatch (2 units), Volkswagen T-Cross (2 units), Volkswagen Tiguan (2 units) and Volkswagen Transporter Crew Bus (2 units) making up the numbers.

The state purchased 19 units of the SA-built Nissan Navara last month.

In addition, the state bought a single unit of each of the following vehicles last month: the Audi A3 Sportback, Audi Q7, Suzuki DZire, Suzuki Ertiga, Volkswagen Caddy, Volkswagen Kombi and Volkswagen T-Roc.

Out of the 542 sales (including trucks) to government in August 2023, Isuzu was the dominate brand with 204 units. The Volkswagen Group (also incorporating Audi sales) was next on 182 units, followed by Toyota (68 units), truck-maker Iveco (51 units), Nissan (27 units), Mahindra (5 units), Ford (3 units) and Suzuki (2 units).

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