No black Christmas for EMLM

Municipality pays R90m towards electricity debt to keep lights on, as agreed with Eskom

Eskom has suspended its intention to interrupt bulk electricity supply in the Enoch Mgijima Local Municipality (EMLM), following a R90m payment towards its debt recently.

EMLM mayor Luleka Gubhula said the R130m equitable share withheld by the National Treasury had been received, and R90m was paid to Eskom as resolved in the last council meeting.

The Rep reported (“EMLM undertakes to pay Eskom, avert power cuts ”, November 8) that the local authority had undertaken to pay the power utility R90m following a meeting between the two parties to discuss ways in which the power interruptions could be averted. Last Monday a delegation “from the municipality met with the Eskom provincial executive to discuss matters concerning municipal debt. We reached an amicable agreement satisfactory to both parties involved.”

Gubhula indicated they had yet to make payments towards their historical debt and the next payment to Eskom would be made on December 20.

We will again pay Eskom R23m which is our November invoice. We decided never to skip our monthly account so we do not accumulate more debt.

Regarding our historical debt, we will speak to the provincial government to assist us in paying the R146m debt to which the former three entities contributed.”

The mayor said they would continue to cut off power in households and businesses that did not pay for services, especially electricity.

We have come to learn that “businesses owe more money to the municipality than households and some are also guilty of stealing it.

We will continue with our “planned programme to cut all those who owe us or are stealing power. We will not say when, but we are coming for them soon enough.”

Gubhula encouraged residents to refrain from stealing power as it was detrimental to the municipality s finances.