Old foes Sanral and Outa are at loggerheads again, over a claim by the roads agency that Gauteng e-tolling isn’t really that unpopular.
Last week Sanral issued the findings of a recent survey which it said debunked claims that there was widespread dissatisfaction among Gauteng road users about e-tolling.
The Quality of Life survey conducted by the Gauteng City Region Observatory (Gcro) polled 30 000 respondents across the province and asked whether they agree with the statement “I will never pay for e-tolls”. The result was that 34 percent of those who are satisfied with roads agreed with the statement and 42 percent disagreed, which Sanral said proved there was a willingness to pay. But Outa (Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse) calls Sanral’s conclusion just desperate propaganda.
“It’s a classic case of twisting the findings of research to suit their agenda. No amount of spin is going to change the public’s minds on e-tolls,” says Outa chairman Wayne Duvenage.
“What is actually happening here is that Sanral is attempting to conflate the new road upgrade with the payment of e-tolls. No-one really denounces the need for the freeway upgrade which took place from 2008 to 2011, however, the vast majority of Gauteng motorists believe the introduction of the irrational and inefficient e-toll scheme is uncalled for and unacceptable,” he says.
This is borne out in the low compliance levels, which Outa estimates at being less than 25% on average since the inception of e-tolls in December 2013.
“If indeed the public were in support of paying e-tolls – as Sanral claims – why then has the compliance been so low? Why also, was there less than 5% uptake in their recent 60% discount dispensation which ran for six months?” asks Duvenage.
Outa says even taxi drivers who are exempt from the scheme have shunned it. After Sanral issued 46 000 e-tags to the taxi industry (to ensure their exemption status is applied), Outa said it polled various taxi ranks to find that less than 1% of taxis in Gauteng had e-tags fitted.
Many previous surveys to gauge public sentiment have indicated a majority of Gauteng road users indicating they won’t pay e-tolls.
“We believe it is about time that Sanral came to terms with failure of Gauteng’s e-toll scheme,” says Duvenage. “As a user-pays mechanism, it was grossly flawed, poorly researched and has failed to even pay for the collection process, let alone being able to service the R20-billion bonds borrowed for the capital injected into the road upgrade and toll system.”
Star Motoring