Prasa is latest to be switched off as Tshwane nets R500m so far

The City of Tshwane has disconnected services at Prasa headquarters due to a debt of R28m owed to it.

The rail entity — which has generators for backup power — said it had been in negotiations over the unpaid bills and hoped an agreement and reconnection would be reached within hours.

Mayor Randall Williams and MMC for roads and transport Dikeledi Selowa, joined by officials from the city, on Thursday continued with the #Tshwaneyatima campaign. The city embarked on the aggressive revenue collection strategy last week, which has seen officials disconnect water and electricity services to some of the worst debtors.

According to the city, the amount owed by Prasa is a consolidation of all the properties it owns in the city. The Hatfield headquarters owes a total of R376,814.94 for prepaid electricity.

Prasa officials present during the disconnection tried to negotiate with the mayor and city officials, to no avail.

“They own properties in Tshwane. We have consolidated it for them. For the properties, they owe us R28m,” Williams said.

Williams said the CEO of Prasa was informed before the disconnection.  

“They have been informed for some time. It’s irresponsible for them not to come forward, not to approach the city, not to come with an arrangement. If they act irresponsibly the city can’t suffer the consequences,” he said.

Williams said the campaign started with a list of over 70,000 accounts out of 900,000. To date they have recovered almost R500m.

On Wednesday the University of SA paid R144m and the University of Pretoria R34m, he said.

Prasa spokesperson Andiswa Makanda said the entity’s services have not been affected by the cut-off.

“It’s our data centre and we have security as well. However, we do have backup generators to ensure that our operations aren’t affected at all,” she said.

Makanda said they have entered into a payment arrangement and are hoping that they will be reconnected in a few hours.

“We do owe a significant amount of money to the city. We were entering into some negotiations, there were things that we needed clarity on, so in that process unfortunately we got our electricity disconnected,” she said.

“It accumulated over a while. It’s about stations in and around Tshwane. We are looking at about 30 stations that we owe electricity for and it has compounded over months. We’re entering into negotiations to see if there is a payment arrangement we could enter into.”

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