By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Transport minister, Sindisiwe Chikunga, has reiterated that the e-toll gantries on Gauteng highways will remain in place to combat crime and enhance road safety.
Chikunga said the existing e-toll infrastructure will be repurposed to improve several aspects of the Gauteng highway system.
“We emphasised that the government was already far advanced with its plan to repurpose the e-toll infrastructure to improve mobility, road safety, and combat crime,” she said.
“It is important to note that while these roads are no longer going to be tolled, the benefits of improved roads remain, and the gantries that have been installed for use in the scheme will continue to be used for other functions, such as fighting crime.”
“The gantry lights and cameras will remain on for road safety purposes, but also for crime-fighting,” she added.
The minister said the government will officially scrap the e-toll scheme at 23:59:59 on Thursday, 11 April 2024. After this, customers will no longer be required to pay e-toll fees.
Last month, she published in the Government Gazette a notice concerning the withdrawal of the toll declaration of the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project, popularly known as e-tolls.
Addressing the media on the end of e-tolling in Gauteng, Chikunga admitted that the system had caused public aggravation and was of great concern to Cabinet.
She said this led to the formation of a three-member committee – made up of the Minister of Transport, Minister of Finance and Gauteng Premier – charged by President Cyril Ramaphosa in July 2019 to find a solution to the impasse.
Chikunga explained that the long process involving government upgrading parts of important national roads in Gauteng began in December 2013, to ensure that the economic hub of South Africa was not jeopardised by poor roads.
She noted that before the upgrades, the roads were extremely congested and had a negative effect on the country’s economy.
She highlighted that the system of e-tolling was implemented after some consultation had taken place.
Chikunga said once the system stopped at midnight on April 11, users would not be required to do anything.
The e-toll website will be updated with respect to the cancellation, including Mobility/Tag account functionality for services, i.e. interoperability and parking, et cetera.
“Importantly, current valid accounts can still be used for payments at toll plazas and other value-added services (i.e parking). This is critical for the ongoing, long-term benefit of interoperability. The tag beeps will stop after midnight on 11 April 2024,” she said.
She explained that the e-toll stores would remain open as the tag could still be used for interoperability, account queries and other potential transport -related services that would be determined in due course.
She added that the e-toll branding would be removed in phases.
Chikunga highlighted that one of the issues the three-member committee had to grapple with was how the South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) was going to repay the debt it incurred to build the infrastructure and how government would ensure that the roads remained up to the standards to which road users had now become accustomed.
“It has not been an easy process and decision because we essentially were being asked to deviate from a principle that is universally accepted: you have to pay for whatever you use,” she said.
She explained that together with Finance Minister Enoch Godongwna and Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi they finally reached agreement towards the end of March on how to conclusively deal with the debt resulting from e-tolls.
“…and as a result, we were able to sign a memorandum of agreement to formalise alternative funding solutions for the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project debt repayment and deal with the backlog of maintanance and rehabilitation costs,” she said.
She stressed that the three-member committee was unambiguous on the fact that the user-pay principle remained a government policy and committed to continually engage and work together to explore adequate and sustainable funding solutions for road construction, maintenance and upgrades to support economic development.
Following the announcement by national government that e-tolls in Gauteng had been officially cancelled, Sanral resolved its long-outstanding application for increased borrowing limits from National Treasury.