Durban - A number of Pietermaritzburg homes will be left in the dark come Monday as Msunduzi Municipality takes its electricity disconnection drive to residential areas.
Some families in the CBD said they were not moved by the threats of the municipality and that illegal “reconnection could be organised.”
The municipality says it’s owed at least R5.5 billion for services and in an effort to recover monies owed, government departments, legal and illegal businesses as well as schools were not spared when services were disconnected in the past week during a name and shame campaign.
However, when the municipal officials returned to some government departments and smaller businesses, it was discovered that they had manage to reconnect illegally and were issued fines.
Some residents believe that high up on the municipality’s list should have been the informal settlements and some areas in the townships that are illegally connected.
Msunduzi was slammed for cutting services at the Plessislaer police station which caused a disruption in services.
This police station records one of the highest number of murder cases in the country and services a vast number of townships.
The municipality could not confirm whether the R3 million owed by the station had been paid in full, but on Friday the station was fully functioning.
On Thursday, the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure, clarified that it had engaged over 257 municipalities and that an amount of R 83 319 809 was being owed to them for services rendered and property rates. Their statement stated that the department was awaiting invoices from municipalities and that payments would be processed as soon as they are received.
Furthermore, Thami Ntuli, the departmental spokesperson, told the Sunday Tribune that the Plessislaer police station building belongs to the municipality.
“The process of having the property transferred back to state, under the custodianship of DPWI is underway,”said Mchunu. “Therefore we do not owe anything to the municipality on that building.”
Melanie Veness, CEO of the Pietermaritzburg and Midlands Chamber of Business said they had cautioned Msunduzi against the naming and shaming campaign as it has potential to cause irreparable damage to reputations of organisations and could lead to legal action when the municipality is at fault.
“Often the tenant occupying the premises gets named and shamed and has actually paid their landlord and it’s the landlord who owes the city the money,” she said.
“While we appreciate that the city needs to embark on disconnection drives such as these to try and address the unacceptably high level of outstanding debt in order to get solvent again, they need to act just as swiftly to reconnect people when they’ve disconnected them in error or when they’ve paid the outstanding debt or when a payment arrangement has been made instead of leaving them disconnected for days, a practice that is damaging businesses,” she said.
Veness said there were wealthy property owners in the city who collect payment for municipal services from multiple tenants and then fail to pay it over to the municipality.
“Unfortunately the people who get negatively impacted are the tenants, the municipality and the general public. Those landlords need to be held to account,” she said.
Ntobeko Mkhize, the city’s spokesperson said some of the businesses and government departments that have been reconnected had reached an agreement with the municipality and a payment arrangement had been put in place.
She said she was unsure about the Plessislaer police station, but if their lights are on it means an agreement had been reached between the municipality and the consumer.
Mkhize said the disconnection drive was continuing and next on the city’s list were residential debtors and they had already visited a few areas.
“We urge all debtors, business, government and residents to come forward to make payments or arrangements where necessary to avoid disconnection,” she said.
SUNDAY TRIBUNE