Last week, Consumer Commissioner Mamodupi Mohlala reportedly
found the terms "excessively one-sided in favour of the supplier, and as
such... not in line with the spirit of the Consumer Protection Act".
She said a clause in the conditions which allowed Sanral to get
information from any institution concerning applicants where they had an
account, was a gross violation of consumer's right to privacy.
"There should be some restriction to the kind of
information that a service provider may have access to as long as it relates to
the nature of the account or to the core business."
In January, Sanral announced that e-tolling, which was meant to
begin this month, had been put on hold to address public concerns and petitions
sent to the Minister of Transport, Sbusiso Ndebele.
Anti-toll petitions were submitted by the Democratic Alliance,
the Congress of SA Trade Unions and the SA National Civics Organisation.
The announcement of the e-tolling system was met with wide
criticism and outrage when it proposed that light motor vehicles with e-tag
accounts would pay R0.49/km to use the toll roads, minibus taxi drivers
R0.16/km and bikers R0.30/km. Vehicles without an e-tag account would be
charged R0.66/km.
The Cabinet later approved reduced toll tariffs for the Gauteng
highway tolling system.
E-toll account registration started in November with registered
users depositing R50 into their accounts to create an initial balance.
Cosatu urged motorists not to buy- e-tags. It said if the tolls
were not scrapped, Cosatu would encourage motorists to drive through the tolls
without paying.
Meanwhile, a number of organisations were reportedly planning to
take legal action against Sanral in an attempt to stop e-tolling on Gauteng's
freeways.
The Road Freight Association said a group of industry players
would take legal action against Sanral and that the legal documentation would
be finalised in a few weeks.
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