Municipality charges double
Many people recon the municipality has cash flow problems and thus this sudden decision.
SECUNDA – Residents are angry about the notice from the Govan Mbeki Municipality that states the municipality will reduce the consumption period of water and electricity from 60 days to 30 days.
It says that metered readings for the period of 1 to 31 December and 1 to 31 January will form part of the billing of February.
Consumers will be given March, April, May and June to settle their accounts.
Many people recon the municipality has cash flow problems and thus this sudden decision.
Some people are of the understanding that if their account is usually R3 500, they will now have to pay R7 000, and others say the municipality got behind with the bills and that is why they want to implement this new consumption period.
Mr Henry Masango from the municipality said: “Please note that the notice refers to the consumption account for water and electricity only for the months of December and January.
“The accounts of these two months will be combined into one account.
“For example, if a consumer has used 5kl of water in December and 3kl in January these two amounts will be combined and read as 8kl.
“This is due to accounts not being sent out in the December festive month since most people had already left for the holidays.”
Mr Hein Badenorst, DA caucus leader, said: “Meter readings not processed on time caused the billing to fall behind.
“Because of this, the account issued to consumers now is on meter readings taken two months ago and the accounts the municipality renders now is to come up to date with the billing process.
“This is typical of the lack of control and the absence of a political will to govern.”
According to Mr Badenhorst, the municipality has a selective application of financial policies because some householders’ electricity is being cut according to the policy, while other consumers who have not paid their bills for years’ electricity is not cut.
“This causes the debtors account to rise to R722 million.
“Add to this the fact that because of negligence by management, the Govan Mbeki Municipality cannot account for 41 per cent of electricity and 90 per cent of water bought from Eskom and the Rand Water Board respectively.”
Eskom was apparently not paid on time by the municipality and this resulted in penalties of R68 289 27 in the 2012/2013 financial year and R10 968 622 in the 2013/2014 financial year.
According to Mr Badenhorst, the outstanding amount that the municipality owed Eskom at the end of November last year, was R244 million and nobody is held accountable.
“There is not enough money to do maintenance because of the huge lost of electricity, penalties for late payment and the fact that some consumers to not pay their accounts.
“Capital expenditures are however mostly funded by grants received from Government and companies in our region, for which we are very grateful.
“Without these grants, the municipality would have closed doors long ago.
“As long as the ANC in council do not adhere to the Constitution of South Aafrica as far as pollution of water resources with sewers is concerned and by not adhering to their own policies, service delivery will keep on going from bad to worse.”
Mr Badenhorst has been trying the whole of last week to get a meeting with the municipal manager to discuss water and electricity issues, but he was apparently busy and could not meet with Mr Badenhorst.
When asked whether it is true that the Govan Mbeki Municipality owes Eskom and Rand Water billions of rand, Mr Masango said: “The law of contract dictates that there should always be a confidentiality clause to most contracts entered between parties.
“Therefore, the questions about the amounts owed for bulk purchases have been obtained from the councillor of the DA who always write and edit your stories.
“A financial report is being presented to Council for deliberation and adoption, where all questions are being fielded, clarified and entertained in detail to all political parties represented in council.
“I thus do not understand why you allow a political party to abuse a community platform like your newspaper.”
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