By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Gauteng MEC for Roads and Transport, Kedibone Diale, has revealed that the Gauteng Provincial Government (GPG) had set up a steering committee to find a solution to how e-tolls in the province can be ended.
Diale revealed this during a recent parliamentary Q&A, that both Gauteng Provincial Government (GPG) and the Department of Transport (DoT) have no plans in place to end e-Tolls.
She said, nothing has come of the committee, and any suggested solutions drafted must still be approved – meaning there are no solutions yet.
Additionally, the GPG was unable to give an exact amount that needs to be paid towards the e-toll debt – suggesting there is also no plan on how the GPG plans to foot its portion of the e-toll debt, which is also a worrying sign.
As a result, The Democratic Alliance (DA) said in a statement that Gauteng residents will have to continue paying for e-Tolls for the foreseeable future. “This is unfair towards the residents of Gauteng, who struggle to make ends meet due to the high cost of living. They also did not agree to the e-Tolling system in the first place,” it said.
The Gauteng Provincial Government and Department of Transport have no plans in place to end e-tolls, and the government’s incompetence clearly indicates that the announcement of e-tolls being scrapped was made prematurely,” the party added.
These remarks are evident in that The South African National Roads Agency (Sanral) confirmed that its collection contract had been extended to 15 December 2023, meaning motorists must pay their e-toll bills until the relevant legislation has been repealed.
The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) labelled the contract extension and consequent delay to the e-toll shutdown as “either gross ineptitude, incompetence, or a reluctance by Government to end the scheme, for some unknown or obscure reason.”
Outa believes the contract extension is an overreach and a waste of money, considering the end of e-tolls was promised to be finalised by the end of 2022.
The Gauteng government previously agreed to be responsible for the other 30% of Sanral’s debt, as well as the maintenance and regular inspection of freeways, bridges and slopes in the province — an exercise that costs at least R3-billion every year. The arrangement was supposed to pave the way for the national government to be taken out of the e-toll saga and for the Gauteng government to be squarely responsible for the upkeep of road infrastructure.
But the arrangement created a headache for the provincial government that Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi didn’t consider when he declared on Twitter that e-tolls “are gone”. It is not yet clear whether the Gauteng government has the financial muscle to pay 30% of Sanral’s debt and the annual R3-billion maintenance bill; where the money will be sourced from, in the light of the province’s deteriorating purse; and where motorists will fall in this funding matrix.
What is clear is that if there is no credible plan for how these questions will be addressed, the consequences will be dire for SA’s economy and the roll-out of crucial infrastructure projects.
Since its launch in 1998, Sanral successfully planned, financed, developed and maintained more than 20,000km of the national road network — comprising tolled and untolled roads. But from October 2007, SA roads and freeways (especially in Gauteng) became highly political and controversial. At the time, the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project (GFIP) was launched by the government, which introduced an electronic tolling system that would charge Gauteng motorists (barring minibus taxis and buses) for the use of new highways in the province.