Cape Town - Lobby group Stop COCT says it has reached a dead-end with the public protector’s office after it turned down their request to probe the City’s unregulated electricity tariffs.
Stop COCT’S Sandra Dickson said: “We approached the public protector regarding the ‘unregulated’ portion of the City of Cape Town Electricity Tariffs.
“The public protector is of the view that this is a legislative issue and that it falls outside its mandate. But the public protector gave Stop COCT guidance on remedies.”
Dickson said: “The government system is set up in such a way that the public has no recourse via the channels and laws set out to protect them.”
The meeting with the public protector comes just after Stop COCT and the National Energy Regulator of SA (Nersa) held mediation talks to discuss the City’s home-user and surcharge rates. For months the organisation was asking questions around the discrepancy between the City’s implemented tariffs across all blocks versus what Nersa publishes as approved tariffs on its website.
Since 2016, the City’s implemented electricity tariffs have been between 2 and 18% higher than the Nersa-approved tariffs. The home-user tariff applies to residents with prepaid meters, living in homes worth more than R1million. It will also apply to residents who have a credit meter, irrespective of the property value.
Dickson said there was no mention of the home-user charge when the City’s draft budget was approved in May. “In spite of this, Stop COCT is pursuing this matter to a positive outcome for everyone buying electricity from the City of Cape Town.”
The public protector’s spokesperson Oupa Segalwe said: “The complaint was about an additional charge by the City on top of what Nersa has approved with regard to electricity tariffs.
The complainants had lodged a complaint with Nersa against the City. It appears that Nersa mediated but the complainants were unhappy that the regulator was not very explicit regarding the reasons for the decision reached.
@MarvinCharles17