Some drove around town and scurried to every electricity vendor, only to be told the machines were offline. At times, no one in Potchefstroom or Ikageng was able to sell power. The stress levels skyrocketed and residents vented their frustration on Facebook.

Victor Boqo, the mayoral spokesperson, says the Internet line was down and caused a technical problem between the municipality and the service provider in December. As a result, most of the vending stations were out of order and community members could only buy electricity at the municipal offices. ‘The municipality made alternative arrangements to divert the internet traffic to all vendors and all vending stations are now working as normal,’ he said.

Some Facebook users wanted to know why consumers cannot buy electricity online as they do with airtime and data.

Boqo says the municipality is currently busy with a contract review with the service provider. He says there is a possibility that consumers will be able to buy electricity online in the near future.

Meanwhile, Hans-Jurie Moolman, a DA councillor, said councillors have serious reservations about this because of irregularities with electricity and paraffin contracts in the past. These were first exposed by an external auditor in a report to council and later confirmed by the Auditor-General in an ad hoc report to council in 2016. The external auditor was fired not long afterwards.

‘Obviously, council would welcome the convenience of an online payment scheme but we are more concerned about the lack of transparency in putting such a system in place. We cannot have corrupt and ulterior motives at the expense of the public,’ he says.

He pointed out that councillors do not have executive powers (to give orders) in the day-to-day running of the municipality but do have a duty and authority, through council as a collective, to act as a watchdog on behalf of the taxpayer.

‘The speaker has reduced the frequency of council meetings from once a month to once a quarter. This makes it almost impossible for councillors to carry out their oversight function properly, especially now that Ventersdorp is included in the municipality,’ he said. ‘The lack of accountability is the reason why so many local governments fail.’

While the municipal manager, as the CEO (chief executive officer) of the municipality, does have the power to appoint a service provider for prepaid electricity payments, this should be governed by strict procurement policy or supply chain management and her delegated authorities from the council. According to Moolman, however, both of the above-mentioned contracts were signed and concluded without the MM having either the mandate or the authority to do so. ‘Tshwane was ruined by a contract awarded to a service provider that did smart metering and payments via the Internet. We stopped the MM from entering into a similar contract that would have cost the rate payer R36 million extra on electricity alone over three years. When we investigated further, we discovered that our ratepayers would have had to cough up an extra R90 million to the service provider.’

The Hawks are investigating pending criminal charges in relation to the awarding of these contracts.

The municipal spokesperson, Willie Maphosa, says, while everyone wants the convenience of an online payment scheme and believes in and works for proper systems and a corruption-free environment, this item has not yet been tabled in council.