{"id":720378,"date":"2023-09-22T10:23:31","date_gmt":"2023-09-22T08:23:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=720378"},"modified":"2023-09-22T10:23:31","modified_gmt":"2023-09-22T08:23:31","slug":"transnet-hits-back-at-indebted-businesses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/720378\/transnet-hits-back-at-indebted-businesses\/","title":{"rendered":"Transnet hits back at &#8216;indebted&#8217; businesses"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>South Africa\u2019s beleaguered state ports and rail company deepened its feud with the private sector, accusing business chambers of intimidation because they owe it money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A letter from a business chamber in Durban, the site of Africa\u2019s biggest container port, to the minister of public enterprises called for Transnet Chief Executive Officer Portia Derby and her team to be removed because of the woeful state of the nation\u2019s ports and freight rail service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-wp-embed is-provider-businesstech wp-block-embed-businesstech\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"zNfPvg03Sn\"><a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/719692\/mounting-pressure-for-transnet-ceo\/\">Mounting pressure for Transnet CEO<\/a><\/blockquote><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;Mounting pressure for Transnet CEO&#8221; &#8212; BusinessTech\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/719692\/mounting-pressure-for-transnet-ceo\/embed\/#?secret=Llzk8M1TNv#?secret=zNfPvg03Sn\" data-secret=\"zNfPvg03Sn\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Prasheen Maharaj, president of the Durban Chamber of Commerce and Industry, is also the CEO of Sandock Austral Shipyards, a unit of which is in a court dispute with Transnet over R116 million in rent that allegedly hasn\u2019t been paid, documents seen and confirmed by Bloomberg show.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThose who owe money will have to pay, and the company will not be intimidated,\u201d Transnet said in a statement on Thursday, which detailed the regular interactions it has with the chamber in a bid to resolve operational issues. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cTransnet will no longer tolerate a distortion of public discourse by individuals who fail to disclose their true motives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Maharaj said a response to Transnet\u2019s statement will be issued after \u201cwe have followed the governance procedures of the Durban Chamber.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Maharaj\u2019s company uses sites at the Port of Durban, owned and run by Transnet, for shipbuilding and ship repairs and is in dispute with the logistics operator after its rent was increased in 2015, the state firm said in the documents. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The amount due, initially almost R43 million, has escalated due to interest and other \u201cunpaid rentals,\u201d Transnet said. The case is currently before the Durban High Court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Transnet didn\u2019t respond to a request for further comment on the dispute with Maharaj\u2019s company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan, in a statement on Tuesday, acknowledged the letter from the Durban Chamber and other groups and said a directive he gave to Transnet\u2019s board three weeks ago to make recommendations on how to improve performance included a review of management.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In 2022, the tonnage of coal railed to the Richards Bay Coal Terminal fell to a 30-year low. A 2021 World Bank index of container port performance ranked Durban 364th out of 370, and two other Transnet ports were also in the bottom 10.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/720008\/massive-payday-for-south-africas-richest-man\/\">Massive payday for South Africa\u2019s richest man<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Transnet said indebted companies are behind the calls for its CEO\u2019s removal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":720416,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[853,2138],"class_list":["post-720378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-south-africa","tag-transnet"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=720378"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720378\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":720440,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720378\/revisions\/720440"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/720416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=720378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=720378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=720378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}