SPCAs warned that municipal services will be discontinued

The City of Mbombela (CoM) has issued both the Nelspruit and the White River SPCAs with a notice of disconnection of services due to outstanding and overdue amounts for services rendered.

As mentioned in a number of previous articles by Lowvelder, a memorandum of agreement existed between these two societies and the CoM; this agreement expired last July.

The SPCA has been trying, to no avail (and since last year), to get the municipality to agree to a meeting so that the agreement could be renewed and the issue of outstanding funds from the CoM’s side could be discussed.

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They have received no feedback on the funds or the renewal of the agreement, and yesterday found themselves with these notices in hand. These were issued by the office of the chief financial officer; the very same office that had lost the initial documents submitted by the Lowveld SPCA in order for them to receive money from the municipality.

According to Clause 3.3 under the Use and Availability of Assets section of the now expired memorandum of agreement, “the municipality waives recovery of all future property rates and taxes, water, sewage and electricity consumption charges ordinarily levied at all three (previously including Barberton) the properties referred to in Clause 3.1 of this agreement.”

In an email addressed to involved parties at the municipality, the chairperson of the White River SPCA, Estelle de Villiers (acting on behalf of Nelspruit as well), wrote the following:

“We still continue to keep the pound open for the public, with no obligation or payment from the CoM as stipulated in our pound agreement. Kindly advise when we can meet to discuss the way forward in this regard.

“We have had Barberton close due to lack of funds. No one at the municipality has made any comment. We stand to lose White River soon should we not find a solution.

“Please advise when you are available for a meeting. I understand that new councillors are being put in place, however, we have little time and no money to continue providing this service.

“The courtesy of attending a meeting would be good business practice.”

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Althought the CoM has yet to respond to Lowvelder’s queries, Thulani Mkhabela, the senior manager for public safety, law enforcement and security, responded to De Villiers’ email advising that the SPCAs’ services not be disconnected “whilst their matter is pending”.

He mentioned that budget adjustments were being done this week with new accompanying paperwork. At the time of going to press, both societies still had their services intact.