Pretoria - Electricity has been reconnected to scores of Pretoria schools which were disconnected due to non-payment of municipal bills.
City manager Jason Ngobeni issued an instruction that electricity be reconnected by 3pm on Sunday to all schools that had been plunged into darkness.
Schools whose connection points are inside the yard were expected to be reconnected by 10am on Monday.
The city embarked on a vigorous debt collection drive by cutting off power supply to 38 of 140 schools in arrears on their services, rates and taxes accounts. Schools collectively owe the city almost R30 million in unpaid rates, taxes and services bills.
Final notices have also been issued to government departments and utilities, municipalities, embassies, businesses and private residents – including the homes of councillors and municipal staff – who owe the city more than R6.6 billion in unpaid municipal accounts.
Ngobeni said he had received a written commitment from his Gauteng Education Department counterpart to settle the debts of the schools in arrears. The money will reflect in the city’s bank account by Friday.
“Disconnecting schools was the most difficult decision we had to take bearing in mind that they are busy with exams. But we had to bite the bullet and disconnect all the entities that owed us,” Ngobeni said. He hoped there would be no recurrence of the situation, forcing the city to disconnect services at schools. “It’s not nice to cut off anyone. However, disconnecting electricity seems to be the only viable method to recoup our money.”
The city issued thousands of notices across all sectors to those whose accounts are in arrears, reminding them of their debt and informing them of the disconnections to follow.
Since the announcement of the drastic revenue collection drive, there has been an increased volume of consumer visits to the city’s main finance office, BKS Building.
Some debtors were seeking to make payment arrangements and others were settling their arrears.
International Relations paid R2.2m in the past few days.
There has also been an increase in enquiries from entities wanting their disconnected power supply restored, settling arrears and making arrangements, Bokaba said.
However, the city will go ahead and disconnect the Madibeng Local Municipality, other government departments, businesses and residential customers.
“We are aware of the impact the Post Office strike has had on the payment of services in respect of delivery of accounts. However, in terms of the Municipal Property Rates, the onus is on the customer to pay their municipal account whether or not they have received a written account,” said Ngobeni.
Meanwhile, the SA National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) said it was taken aback to see its name among government departments and agencies that allegedly owe the city for electricity and municipal bills. The last statement received from the city on November 5 reflected the agency owing R91 309.
“We made a payment equal to the sum of R414 596 on October accounts. This included a payment for rates, electricity and water for our head office,” spokesman Vusi Mona said. Sanral’s northern region office operated its electricity account on a prepaid basis and suspected something was wrong with the city’s billing system.
Pretoria News