DA Welcome Court Ruling to Scrap Tshwane City Cleansing Levy

Cllr Jacqui Uys DA Tshwane Spokesperson on Finance
DA Tshwane Spokesperson on Finance

By Cllr Jacqui Uys
DA Tshwane Spokesperson for Finance

In February this year the Democratic Alliance (DA) called on the ANC coalition in the City of Tshwane not to introduce any new taxes on residents.

In the months following, the DA repeatedly warned the ruling coalition not to treat Tshwane residents as cash cows in an attempt to balance their books.

Regardless of widespread public outcry, the ANC, EFF and ActionSA pushed forward and adopted a ‘funded’ budget that relied on the introduction of a city cleansing levy.

Today, in a victory for all citizens of Tshwane, at the behest of AfriForum, the court has set aside this cleansing levy as unlawful and ordered the levy to be scrapped and, where already implemented, reversed.

Tshwane imposed this new levy on all properties that are using private waste contractors to remove their waste.

This means properties where there was no service being rendered by the City, are being charged extra by the City.

Tshwane did this in order to raise over R500 million in new revenue.

It is essential to distinguish this daylight robbery from charges levied in a Metro to pay for actual services rendered.

Charging a fee for rendering no services, on people who receive private services, is daylight robbery.

The DA welcomes this decision and calls on the City of Tshwane to urgently rework its now un-funded budget to avoid breakdowns in service delivery.