Pushback against high double-billing ongoing
The metro admits to double-billing residents already paying for waste removal via the controversial city cleansing tariff. Thousands were wrongly charged, pushing the DA and Freedom Front Plus into action.
In what is a victory for overburdened municipal consumers, the metro has admitted to double-billing residents who already use the metro’s weekly waste collection service by means of the so-called controversial City Cleansing Tariff.
The metro’s marketing department said in a release dated September 26 that the metro has identified an ‘anomaly’ while configuring the billing system for implementation of the city cleansing tariff.
“The city will correct all affected accounts”, said the release.
Cilliers Brink, leader of the DA in the city council, said by its own admission, the metro has said the tariff is not intended for households that already pay the metro upward of R400 a month for weekly waste collection.
“Yet thousands of these accounts have already been charged an additional R223 for ‘city cleansing’. This is in reality [a] mess caused by an ANC/EFF/ActionSA coalition determined to shake down residents, without actually improving services,” said Brink.
The DA pointed to the double-billing issue this week and committed to helping residents to redress the problem.
“The metro’s response confirms that there is a billing crisis, and that Mayor Nasiphi Moya has lost control of her finance MMC, Eugene Modise,” said Brink, who was also billed twice.
“The townhouse complex where I live pays Tshwane for waste removal, but now each of our residents has been billed for city cleansing too. That’s double-billing.
“I told the city manager and CFO, and they said I should send the details for correction. We will be sending everything. I have told every DA councillor in Tshwane to collect the details of all double-billed residents, and we will be insisting that the charges be reversed.
“We suspect that thousands of accounts might be affected, but it’s important to inform people that if their complex already pays Tshwane, there cannot be a ‘miscellaneous’ or a ‘waste collection’ charge on their account for a further R233.53 a month,” said Brink.
He explained it is also important to note that this applies regardless of whether the city wins its case on the cleansing tariff that the metro is presently appealing against.
“That tariff is only intended for households that do not use Tshwane’s bin-lifting service,” said Brink.
Brink warned that this happened because the metro knows that its own information does not distinguish between properties that owe this tariff and those that do not.
“They are flying blind, and hoping that residents either would not notice the extra amount on their bill or would think that everyone just has to pay this. That is why they hide the charge as ‘miscellaneous’ or ‘waste collection, ’” he said.
He also points out that the metro’s dispute system has already crashed due to all the disputes related to the cleansing levy.
“The DA and our councillors will do our best to help complexes that are being double-billed. If the city does not want to assist, we will go to court,” he warned.
The tariff, which, according to the metro’s admission, should only be charged on properties that do not use the metro’s waste removal services, was recently challenged in court by AfriForum, and the metro decided to appeal the outcome of that court case.
On July 31, in a case brought by AfriForum, the Pretoria High Court ruled against the levy, declaring it unlawful, invalid and void.
The metro recently approached the Appeal Court in a bid to retain the right to bill residents the controversial cleansing tariff of R194.37 per month (excluding VAT). The Freedom Front Plus (FF Plus) strongly objected to this.
The High Court ruling stated that the metro had failed to meet the requirements of Section 229 of the Constitution, or Section 74 of the Municipal Systems Act.
The Court made it very clear that the levy constitutes unlawful double taxation, particularly for residents of residential complexes and estates who already pay for private waste removal services.
Dehan Harmse, councillor of the FF Plus, said the court also ordered that all accounts should be credited with the levy amount in the next billing cycle, and that the Metro has to implement this by September 2025.
He said the FF Plus opposed the levy from the outset and has also launched a petition to pressure the metro not to reinstate such unlawful billing.
The petition can be accessed at: https://forms.gle/oXyASZ6JRq5zTPvL9.
In addition, the FF Plus submitted a motion to hold the MMC for Finance, Obakeng Ramabodu, personally liable for the relevant legal costs for the levy court case. The court ruled in the first case that AfriForum’s legal costs must be paid by the metro.
“It is unacceptable to have taxpayers shelling out to cover the metro’s legal costs relating to cases that have already been decided and are highly unlikely to succeed,” Harmse said.
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