Government entities that are located in the City of Tshwane owe the municipality about R2.5-billion in unpaid rates and taxes.
This was revealed by Tshwane Executive Mayor Dr Nasiphi Moya during an interview with Sunday World Engage.
Those who have not been paying their rates and taxes to Tshwane include national departments, whose head offices are all located in Pretoria, as well as state entities at national and provincial level.
Moya, a no-nonsense mayor who has been leading the city’s #TshwaneYaTima campaign, says there is no one who can escape their debt, including government departments and entities.
The #TshwaneYaTima campaign is a heavy-handed measure that involves cutting off the services of those in arrears.
It has so far been implemented to [private residents and businesses and is extending to the government departments and entities to recoup the much-needed monies to accelerate service delivery in the city.
Overall, the city is owed R30-billion in unpaid rates and taxes by residents, businesses and government entities.
With Moya having stated financial stability as one of her administration’s top priorities, she vowed she would leave no stone unturned in chasing those that owe to pay up or have services cut off.
In Moya’s approach, there will be no holy cows, and she has already demonstrated guts by touching the usually untouchable such as big businesses like Pick n Pay.
“Not all national departments and government entities are in compliance. In terms of the rates and taxes, I am sitting with a list of departments that have not paid us for over a year; that is more than 365 days where a department has not honoured its current account” said Moya.
“One of my colleagues (MMC for agriculture and environment management) switched off the national Department of Land Reform and Rural Development, who owe us R1.2-million.
“Sometimes it is the provincial government. They do not honour their rates and taxes accounts, and they come and say ‘Mayor you are not managing your finances’, and my response is, ‘how do you manage something that is not in your bank account?’ It is a terrible practice by government to not pay.”
Moya said it would be silly to apply the #TshwaneYaTima selectively by only targeting private residents and businesses while letting government entities get off scot-free.
“If we are cutting off businesses and private individuals, government will also be cut off so they can feel what the residents are feeling as well.
“Of the R29-billion debt, it’s more than R2-billion that national departments and government entities owe us, which would give us the funded budget. Either they will willingly pay up, or they will be forced to do it. One way or the other, they will pay us.”
As if the unpaid rates and taxes are not enough, Moya continued, there are a lot of government buildings, including some belonging to Tshwane, that also do not comply with the expected standards.
As such, the city has established a bad buildings committee chaired by MMC for corporate and shared services Kholofelo Morodi, who is expected to report to the rest of the mayoral committee soon.
The strategy is meant to extend to abandoned buildings within the city as well as hijacked buildings alongside those that do not meet the standards.
“What we wanted to avoid is evicting people. We want to have a coordinated approach so that when we start, we just continue, so we hope that by June or July we will have an investment summit where we will give away these buildings to the private sector.
“This week I am also meeting vice-chancellors of universities in Tshwane to make an offer for student accommodation needs. StatsSA has told us City of Tshwane must avail 43 000 beds, but we do not have the budget, but we do have the assets – the buildings and land – which is what I’ll be offering to the VCs.”
Moya has become a sensation of most Gautengers, even those staying in other metros, even calling for her to be transferred to their cities. She said she was focused on turning Tshwane around.
Her priority mission is to improve economic growth, which has plummeted from 6% in 2011 to 0.3% by the time she took over the reins.
“If we get that right between now and November next year, that would be a measure of success for this administration.”
