“SCRAP DEBT FOR ALL RESIDENTS OF MAMELODI, NOT ONLY INDIGENTS!” – MTSHWENE

President of Concerned Residents for Service Delivery in Mamelodi Oupa Mtshweni adresses the residents of Mamelodi photo by Dimakatso Modipa

Mamelodi Concerned Residents for Service Delivery President Oupa Mtshwene insists that the City of Tshwane Municipality’s recent announcement to scrap rent debts is pretentious and amounts to paying lip service.

“If the City of Tshwane Municipality was really serious then it would have followed the Municipal Systems Act instead of making the said announcement unilaterally,” he said.

“The Municipal Systems Act clearly indicates that the Municipality doesn’t have the right to take decisions on any issue whatsoever without first conducting public participation meetings,” Mtshwene pointed out.

He also pointed out that the Municipality’s decision to only scrap the rent debt owed by the so-called indigent residents is flawed and amounts to the proverbial “divide-and-rule” tactic.

“It is not only the so-called indigent residents who were subjected to an unfair billing system which was based on estimations rather than actual readings indicated in the water and electricity meters, and we are therefore saying the debt of all residents of Mamelodi must be scrapped irrespective of whether they are described as indigents or not because all residents of Mamelodi were cheated by the estimations conducted by the City of Tshwane Municipality all these years,” he said.

“As the Mamelodi Concerned Residents for Service Delivery we obtained a court judgment against the Municipality in 2018, whereby the Pretoria High Court ordered the Municipality to scrap all debts owed by residents, but that court order has been ignored by all the subsequent Mayors of Tshwane including the present one Dr Nasiphi Moya,” he said.

Mtshwene is still calling for a monthly flat rate of R40 per household “as the Municipality still doesn’t know what it is doing in terms of billing residents, and residents can’t pay for a debt that they don’t owe.”

He insisted that the Municipality doesn’t have actual evidence regarding the alleged debt.

Mtshwene also decried the inexplicable, so-called “Miscellaneous costs” which are always reflected in the accounts of residents, saying this is merely a ploy for the Municipality to make money out of unsuspecting residents.

“Coercing residents to make arrangements to pay the so-called debt in exchange of the so-called amnesty is a blatant and illegal way of forcing residents to acknowledge and pay a debt that they don’t know,” said Mtshwene.

Now regarding the new prepaid meters that have been installed at the homes of those who have made arrangements to pay their debts, Mtshwene said they want to know if the meters come directly from Eskom or from a private company that has won a tender in the Municipality and if the latter holds true, then he would like to know as to how much that tender will cost the Municipality.

Mtshwene also highlighted the following points against the Municipality:

1.Many Councillors owe debts to the Municipality yet they are not forced to make arrangements to pay off their debts.

2.Last year Deputy Mayor Eugene Modise promised to root out illegal water and electricity connections at squatter camps but has not done so until now.

3.The Municipality has started cutting off electricity at schools and that an example is the Morakoma Primary School in Mamelodi West.

“Cutting off electricity at schools is in contravention of Section 28 of the Constitution which among other issues deals with children’s rights,” enthused Mtshwene.