The front page story “‘Water cut due to flag’: Indebted Bo-Kaap residents feel targeted by City" (Friday, June 28 2024) refers:
One of the more predictable and sometimes comical features of our ‘South Africaness’ seems to be that when we face the consequences of our own actions, we prefer to claim that we're the victims of conspiracy rather than accept responsibility.
Everyone would rather advance ever more incredulous conspiracy theories than accept the most obvious and simple (and factual) explanation.
A building in the Bo-Kaap is the subject of the City’s debt collection efforts because its residents owe more than R15m in outstanding rates and service charges.
Engagements about this debt has been ongoing for more than three years. It is one of many thousands of customers that owe the City money and which face exactly the same action, regardless of who they are, where they live or what is painted on their front wall.
A culture of paying for the services that you use is essential for building a successful society in South Africa. I think every reasonable person would agree with this statement.
The City relies on customers paying for the services they use to fund everything that our City does - all of our services, metro police officers, roads, new infrastructure investments, support for the poorest - all of this relies on all of us paying for what we use.
Overall, the City is currently owed over R6 billion in outstanding rates and service charges - we publish the names of our biggest debtors each month, and we take legal action against many of them including through court processes. We also offer significant debt forgiveness programmes, but only if debtors stick to their payment plans, which this building sadly has not done.
So it is very easy for any member of the public or newspaper to confirm that the City’s revenue collection department acts without fear or favour in doing their job, which is to collect that which is rightfully owed.
According to the Credit Control and Debt Collection Policy as well as the provisions of Section 115 of the Municipal Systems Act, 32 of 2022, the City has a duty to act to safeguard municipal income and to perform debt management actions.
Once the stage of final demand is reached, the City’s automated SAP accounting system pushes out the notification to teams on the ground who visit properties based on the data received. They have no knowledge of the particulars of an area or building.
The idea that the City has taken this action because of a recent flag painting is therefore no more than a preposterous conspiracy theory, and is just another attempt to further the deliberate disinformation campaign against the City and the party that governs it about this issue.
* Councillor Siseko Mbandezi, Mayco Member for Finance, City of Cape Town.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
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