Sanral bags R250 million from e-tolls
Sanral has collected over R250.8 million in e-toll revenue since the launch of the system in December 2013 – a figure higher than what the roads agency forecast.
This is according to Sanral CFO, Inge Mulder, who noted that R953 million in revenue has been recorded; however this figure represents the nominal value of transactions, excluding VAT.
“The values have not been adjusted in terms of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) which requires the amount to be fair valued and impaired, if applicable,” Mulder said.
“The values are therefore subject to change during the financial year end process, and will still be reviewed by the Auditor-General for accuracy and completeness.”
No provision for bad debt has been included, Sanral said.
The agency said that it also expects Moody’s to improve the rating it gave Sanral following the “positive news”, and hopes this will further boost investor confidence in the bond market.
“The rating agency was concerned with the uncertainty around the commencement date and reserved their opinion on the future rating. We are now back to where we were two years ago and we hope that, based on these numbers, the rating will change,” Mulder added.
Nazir Alli
E-tag progress
Sanral noted that the agency was progressing in registering vehicles, with a figure of 1.24 million users registered by end of February 2014.
“We made Parliament understand that there were no major issues with registered users and that of the 1.2 million registered users, 964,886 (78%) users had purchased an e-tag, with the remainder of 277,431 (22%) opting for the Vehicle Licence Number plate registration,” said Sanral CEO, Nazir Alli.
“We also conceded to Parliament that where we have issues is with unregistered users and the majority of queries included cloned number plates and vehicles without number plates – which we are attending to as a matter of priority and is being done in conjunction with the Department of Transport,” he said.
According to Sanral, since toll commencement, approximately the 2.5 million vehicles have been identified on the Gauteng network.
[Update] Sanral has clarified that a previous figure of 999,310 e-tags issued and 282,806 VLNs registered was reflective of total e-tags in March. This would indicate that, to date in March, 34,424 e-tags have been added.
Who’s lying?
The figures released by Sanral are a direct contradiction to figures released by transport minister, Dipuo Peters, in response to a parliamentary question on the matter on 5 March, 2014.
In her answer to a question asked by DA MP, Ian Ollis, as to how many registrations had taken place to 1 February 2014, she stated that the number was 912,048 registrations as at 31 January 2014.
According to head of Justice Project South Africa, Howard Dembovsky, the figures simply do not fly.
“It is very difficult, if not impossible to believe that more than 287,952 new registrations would have taken place in the 28 days in February, especially in light of the fact that Sanral’s repeated claims that around 35,000 registrations take place a week,” Dembovsky said.
The JPSA head added that the statement by Peters, that between 23% and 28% of the daily users of Gauteng’s e-roads have e-tags, indicates that 72% of road users are not tagged.
More on Sanral and e-tolls
E-tolls must be debated provincially: Outa
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