EThekwini seeks to amend debt policy
A NUMBER of court cases between eThekwini Municipality and various debtors has prompted the city’s Executive Committee (Exco) to seek approval of its full council to amend the current Credit Control and Debt Collection Policy.
The debtors include parastatals, councillors and municipal employees who owe the municipality millions for different services, Exco heard yesterday.
As of January 31, the city is owed R16.2 million by Transnet, while Tansnat, Emtateni Logistics and Easy Does It owe the municipality R139m, R5.3m and R9.6m respectively, according to a report tabled yesterday.
Seventeen councillors owe the municipality R190 511 while 2 040 municipal employees owe R11.1m.
The municipality has been embroiled in a number of disputes with residents around the city with claims that the billing system was faulty.
There’s also an ongoing battle over who should pay who between the city and Tansnat, a company which was awarded a multimillion-rand tender to run the city’s bus system.
An exact number of court cases was not provided at the meeting.
In an e-mailed response to the Daily News queries on the subject, the City said: “The High Courts, all divisions, Court of Appeal and Constitutional Court were all informed of the decision to amend the policy.”
According to the City’s statement, the cost of these cases would depend on the case and in which division the judgment was made.
“A review of the policy, if it has clauses that are not consistent with the National and Provincial Legislation and/or Judgments, is necessary”.
The policy amendment would not go out for public participation, which irked the DA.
But Piet du Plessis, head of revenue management, explained that there was no legal obligation for public participation.
Du Plessis said the statutory obligation to maintain the policy entailed regular reviews. He said the Supply Chain Policy had to be amended annually, and that this was not a new policy, but “just an amendment”.
“There are court cases that prompted the municipality to look into changes to this policy. It is unnecessary to raise concerns about this move because the amendments seek to ensure alignment with recent court judgments, coherence in policies and with the legislation and promotion of best practice.
“We can share with council all the information, including the cases that informed the decision for the amendment,” Du Plessis said.
The amendments would allow the municipality to exercise its “common-law” right to terminate service agreements after providing written notice of not less than 14 days to the customer, and if the customer concerned has breached or failed to comply with any specific term or condition of the service agreement, and has failed to remedy such breach.