South African National Roads Agency Limited’s (Sanral) executives have taken home a cool R24 million in salaries and bonuses amid a R1.1 billion loss for the group in 2015.<\/p>\n
In its year ended March 2015, Sanral reported total revenue of R11.7 billion, and other income totalling R404.3 million.<\/p>\n
With operating expenses hitting R10 billion for the period, the group highlighted an operating profit of R2.08 billion. This was substantially more than a profit of R289 million in 2014.<\/p>\n
Income from investments added R578 million to the profit pool; however finance costs related to interest on financial liabilities amounted to R3.72 billion, dragging the company to a R1.1 billion loss.<\/p>\n
The company suffered a R2.3 billion loss in 2014.<\/p>\n
Sanral is a not-for-profit state-owned entity, and is primarily tasked with building and maintaining the country’s road infrastructure.<\/p>\n
However, the company still needs to aim for profitability in order to pay off it’s debts, at R90 billion – R68.5 billion of which is owed within the next 10 years.<\/p>\n
The bulk of the debt is tied to capital market loans.<\/p>\n
Executive remuneration amounted to over R24 million for the group.<\/p>\n
Sanral CEO Nazir Alli’s total pay came to R4.032 million, including a base salary of R2.214 million (up from R2.016 million in 2014) and a performance bonus of R1.27 million. Pension and other contributions amounted to R548,000.<\/p>\n
Other Sanral executives took home R16.3 million in total, including R2.6 million for Sanral CFO Inge Mulder, and R2.9 million for engineering executive JJ Smit.<\/p>\n
Non-executive directors took home a collective R4 million.<\/p>\n
Alli reached retirement age in August, and was due to resign as soon as a new CEO has been appointed.<\/p>\n
In its report, Sanral lists e-toll revenues to the tune of R3.8 billion for the financial year, excluding discounts.<\/p>\n
E-toll opposition group, Outa, has raised questions over the amount, however, saying that Sanral’s own numbers show that for the year only R1.04 billion in e-tolls have been collected – 27% of the amount.<\/p>\n
“This implies that Sanral believes the difference of R2.8 billion is collectible from the public, which is highly unlikely, even at the implied 60% discounts indicated,” it said.<\/p>\n
Sanral reported that 1.3 million e-tag holders were registered, which Outa points out was the same number reported for over a year. In the same time, E-toll revenues had halved, the group said.<\/p>\n
Further, Outa highlighted comments by the auditor general which stated that, since the introduction of the revised e-toll fee structure, the project will continue and that uncertainty around the system has been removed.<\/p>\n
Outa said that this implies that the scheme is now practical and able to collect the required revenue – which is simply not the case.<\/p>\n
“If history is anything to go by (and it should be in this matter), compliance will probably never exceed 50% of the road users and there is no certainty of the scheme\u2019s success in this regard,” Outa said.<\/p>\n
“It has certainly failed as a user-pay mechanism and, on an international basis, similar tolling schemes generally fail at compliance levels below 80%.”<\/p>\n
E-toll evader found guilty, fined R20,000<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n \u2018Come charge me for refusing to pay e-tolls\u2019<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n