No moral tolls for immoral govt

It’s no surprise that the SA National Roads Agency’s (Sanral) revenue from e-tolls slumped 63% to just R687.7 million by March 2019. From the start, the project – to improve Gauteng’s existing highways – had little or no buy-in from the public. Ever since gantries went live in 2013, many motorists refused to pay. Despite repeated intimidatory tactics on the part of Sanral, the boycott has never wavered … and has deepened in the past year.

It doesn’t help Sanral, or the government which controls it, that the issue has become a political football. The ANC’s Gauteng leaders realised a while ago that to hang on to such an antidemocratic project was going to badly damage their street credibility.

Nor has it helped that, in changing its attitude from staunch defence of e-tolls to wavering acceptance of the possibility they could be scrapped, the ANC has accelerated the defiance.

Sanral has not helped matters, either, by trying to divert attention from the real issues at play. It claims that without an acceptance of the policy of tolling as a road funding mechanism, it will not be able to finance new roads.

That ignores the reality that motorists do not have a problem with paying for new roads which they use occasionally and will take them away from their normal commutes.

They object vociferously – and rightly so – to paying for existing roads where they live, roads which should be funded out of the huge tax burden they bear.

There is also the problem that, with the ANC, there seems to be an attitude of: you shut up and pay, while we steal. Corruption means billions of rands, which could have been used on maintenance and replacement of road infrastructure, have been looted.

So, to twist a liberation struggle saying: no moral tolls for an immoral government.