The order was granted by the Pretoria High Court in October allowing Eskom to proceed with the execution of the judgement.

In a statement Eskom said it has started with the execution steps against the municipality to recover some of the municipality debt, including attaching the local authority’s bank accounts and movable assets.

“Emfuleni Municipality is currently indebted to Eskom to the amount of R5.3 billion despite several litgations brought by the power utility since March 2018 to get the municipality to service its account,” Eskom said.

“Despite the municipality’s healthy revenue collection rate of about 90% from its customers, the local government still failed to pay a portion of its overdue account.”

The state-owned electricity supplier said the power utility has also served ELM with further summons of R3.4 billion for non-payment of its bulk electricity supply and to date, the local authority has failed to file a plea setting out the reasons for non-payment.

“This resulted in Eskom and the municipality customers applying to the court to transfer the municipality’s electricity distribution licence or part thereof to Eskom.”

This application is to be heard in March 2023 and would set a precedence for municipalities failing to pay their Eskom debt and complying with the Electricity Supply Agreements (ESA), Eskom continues to comply with the ESA signed by both parties by supplying the local government with the required electricity to meet its obligations to its customers.”

On Monday ELM confirmed the threats by the power utility to attach its account to recover R1,3 billion owed to the power utility.