Cape Town - The Robben Island Museum has spent a hefty R10 million on repairs and private boat hire in the past two years after being left high and dry by ferry woes – in spite of spending R26m on a new state-of-the-art craft just five years ago.
For years the embattled World Heritage Site has made news for all the wrong reasons. And now it has emerged that in the past financial year the museum forked out nearly R3.3m on repairs to the newest ferry,
Sikhululekile.
And that comes on top of repairs of nearly R2m in the 2011/12 financial year, according to Arts and Culture Minister Paul Mashatile, who was responding to a parliamentary question by the IFP’s Hilda Msweli.
The ferry, bought in 2008, is designed to carry 800 to 1 200 visitors a day but has experienced several breakdowns and other problems that have put it out of action periodically since it arrived.
The Dias, an older ferry, has also racked up its own hefty repair costs – R858 573.95 in 2011/12 and R775 726.72 in 2012/13 financial year.
These costs exclude repairs to both ferries this year.
Robben Island spokesman Shoni Khangala confirmed that only the Sikhululekile is operational. But he said the ferry was big enough to meet demand.
The craft has, however, been out of the water for several weeks between April and last month. Khangala said the repair costs this year totalled R401 803.03. But this figure excluded outstanding invoices.
The Dias, meanwhile, has been out of the water for most of this year. In June, it emerged the Dias had not been operational since January. At the time, it was reported that it would be ready again by last month.
For that ferry, Khangala said, the repair costs have come to R158 898.48.
Repair costs for the third ferry, the Susan Kruger, an old and slow vessel dating back to 1959 and named after apartheid minister Jimmy Kruger’s wife, were not requested by Msweli in Parliament.
Mashatile also revealed that the museum had spent almost R2.6m on private boat hire when the ferries were out of commission.
Khangala said this amount encompassed both the 2011/12 and 2012/13 financial years.
The museum has previously said that the cost of hiring private boats came to R7 980 to R22 000 per trip, with ticket sales covering the cost.
According to the museum’s 2011/12 annual report, 352 229 people visited the island that year, just slightly more than the previous year.
The report noted that “numbers are not growing significantly”.
It also noted that the museum’s income had increased because of an increase in fare prices, and the fact that they had not been forced to hire any private boats that year.
December tourism statistics, released by Economic Development MEC Alan Winde, have shown that the number of tourists visiting the island is declining.
In December 2011, the island saw 7.5 percent fewer tourists than during the same month the previous year.
Last December saw a further drop of 4.7 percent, apparently due to three “bad weather days” which cost the island 5 000 visitors.
Winde has previously called the island “a blemish on our tourism industry”.
Last week he said the ferry breakdowns left foreign visitors disappointed, especially when they had “come to our country to stand at the site of Nelson Mandela’s imprisonment”.
“This not only has an economic impact, but is potentially brand damaging.”
But Winde conceded that the situation had improved “since 2010, when ferry breakdowns were causing massive travel disruptions”, largely because management was now calling on private vessel owners to provide services when the ferry was not operational.
“This has gone some way to mitigate the inconvenience caused by the vessel’s mechanical problems,” he said.
Winde reiterated his previous suggestions that a full maintenance plan be put in place for the ferry, that the national departments of Arts and Culture and Tourism work more closely on the issue of Robben Island, and that visitors be allowed more freedom to explore, through a “hop on, hop off” bus system, so they were not limited to the existing tightly controlled, closed-top buses.
The Sikhululekile has been bedevilled with problems from its arrival. Initially set to launch in 2007, it ran a year behind schedule, and was only launched in February 2008. A few weeks later, it broke down for the first time.
In August that same year, the boat manufacturers attached the vessel because the museum still owed money.
It suffered seven major breakdowns between 2008 and 2010 – including during the busy 2009 December season. It was also out of action for the first few days of the World Cup in June 2010.
That same year it emerged that police were investigating possible sabotage of the ferry, and there were reports of fuel being stolen off it.
A forensic audit also found irregularities around the purchase of the boat, with the contract obviously favouring the boat builders.
Earlier this year, Robben Island Museum officials briefed Parliament on the museum’s turn-around strategy.
Following several years of adverse audit opinions, the museum has for the past two years received unqualified audits.
However, officials told Parliament’s arts and culture portfolio committee they believed a “more reliable ferry” and conference facilities could help boost tourist numbers.
Reviews of the Robben Island tour on the international tourist website TripAdvisor range from glowing to terrible. Many complained that the ferry was either late or cancelled, and some also said it was difficult to get a refund after a cancellation.
“The arrangements, the information, the transporting systems arrangements, were all catastrophic,” one person wrote after visiting in April.
Another wrote that they had to be picked up from the island after their tour by the Jolly Roger, a “novelty pirate ship”, after the boat arrived late to pick up passengers and did not have the capacity to take them all back at once.
Weekend Argus