Eskom chasing after Tshwane over R1.4 billion electricity bill
Eskom says the City of Tshwane’s (CoT’s) electricity debt has once again ballooned to R1.4 billion after a series of short payments and non-payments over the last several months.
The power utility said that the CoT’s debt exacerbates the cash flow crisis it faces, where it is owed around R57 billion from non-paying customers.
Tshwane short-paid its November 2022 bill of R680 million and also did not pay R780 million for its December 2022 account, Eskom said.
Although Eskom engaged with the CoT on numerous occasions to settle its November account by December 31 2022, the bill remains unpaid.
Eskom said that it approached the Department of Co-Operative Governance & Traditional Affairs (CoGTA) to mediate with the CoT over its poor payments.
The Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) states that institutions must recover what is owed to them, which was why Eskom approached CoGTA.
Eskom said that the mediation process was in line with section 41(2) of the Intergovernmental Relations Framework Act 13 of 2005 in August 2022, when Eskom initially declared a dispute.
Earlier this month, the CoT was approached by Eskom to settle its long outstanding invoice for November 2022, but no solution was found.
Eskom said that it cannot finance the CoT’s operations and has called on the CoT to pay its account to ensure that it can continue supplying electricity to the city’s residents.
A recurring problem
Over the last several months, Eskom has made numerous pleas to the CoT to settle its electricity debt.
In August 2022, Eskom threatened to disconnect the CoT after it failed to pay its R1.6 billion bill. The CoT would later settle that debt, but the issue continued.
The CoT’s bill on November 30 2022 again hit R1.6 billion after the city failed to pay its September and October bills and other arrears.
The city’s finances have consistently faced scrutiny over the last couple of months.
As reported by TimesLive, a leaked Auditor-General (AG) report found that the city’s finances were irregular in an adverse audit opinion. The AG’s findings included R10.5 billion of irregular expenditure that could not be accounted for.
CoT mayor Randall Williams later said that the city would be laying charges against former CFO Umar Banda due to the poor quality of the financial records, violating the Municipal Finance Management Act.
Sipho Stuurman, the mayor’s spokesperson, said that the charges against Banda would be determined at the council’s next meeting, set for Thursday, January 26.
Read: Eskom’s worst-performing power station – where workers fear for their lives
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