R12m a month lost in electricity theft
The national cabinet representative (NCR) says Enoch Mgijima Local Municipality incurs losses in electricity at R12m per month.
Meanwhile, progress made by the intervention so far was that the status quo report was 100% complete.
Dr Monde Tom, who was with EMLM mayor Thembeka Bunu and chief whip Nombuyiselo Ndebe, said this at a press briefing at the Bathandwa Ndondo Office Park on Tuesday.
He is set to present his findings on the status quo to council on August 11.
The report would be tabled to the National Treasury on Monday, Tom said. This will include the report on the 68 ghost employees investigation which was to be finalised last week.
The NCR indicated finance, service delivery, governance and institutional development as the critical areas he would focus on as he had a team of experts specialising in these areas.
“The aim is to assist in the finance budget to ensure that it is a funded budget, to ensure cost containment, especially with the huge salary bill the municipality is burdened by,” Tom said.
He said they would look to see that rates and taxes were collected and service providers such as Eskom paid.
They had met with Eskom and the Development Bank of South Africa recently. “We need to reduce losses of power. We need to find a way to reduce outages. The revenue losses ranging from 40 to 50%, that is R12m a month.
“Last year the Eskom bill was about R290m whit revenue losses ranging from 40 to 50%.”
He said this year the municipality was planning to make a bulk purchase of power for R250m. If there are no controls he estimated EMLM could lose about R10m a month
“We also need to reduce tampering with meters and illegal connections. Refuse collection, road maintenance and street lighting needed attention.”
He said the huge salary bill for May had resulted in a payment of R230m instead of R330m, a 30% difference.
The declining primary sources of revenue, property rates and the decline in bulk purchases, was a concern.
“The NCR has engaged with the troika, mayoral committee and municipal management on numerous occasions in an attempt to understand the political and administrative governance of EMLM.”