SAMWU Rejects E-toll Dispensation as Presented by Deputy President
- Published on 21 May 2015
- HR Pulse News Desk
The South African Municipal Workers’ Union (SAMWU) rejects the etoll dispensation as presented by Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa on the 20th May 2015.
The Deputy President announced that the dispensation will include a monthly cap of R225 for light motor vehicles while the cap for other vehicle categories would be determined at a later state and that there would be a 60% discount for motorists who have not been paying since etoll’s inception in December 2013.
The fact that the government had opted to for a drastic reduction of 60% in arrears is indicative of the pressure that the system is under as a result of civil disobedience. No matter how enticing the government may want to be, we urge South African to vehemently refuse to pay a single cent towards this neoliberal project that seeks to privatise our country’s national roads.
Of great concern to us is government’s attempt to coerce South Africans into paying for etolls. This they want to achieve by forcing people to settle their etoll bills before they can be allowed to renew their motor vehicle license. Clearly this attempt would not work but would instead result in unintended consequences such as a high number of vehicles with outdated licence discs. The government is actually creating more headaches for themselves.
When announcing the dispensations, the Deputy President claimed that the dispensations were a step in addressing the needs of South Africans and that they were affordable. Contrary to the Deputy President’s claim, these dispensations do not in any way address the needs of South African not to mention that they remain unaffordable. The problem with this is that people who have been involved in these dispensations do not use their private vehicles but rather state provided vehicles and as such they do not have to pay a single cent towards them. They therefore cannot claim to speak on behalf of South Africans as they are on a league of their own. Etolls do not only affect motorists but also businesses who will definitely shift the extra cost of doing business to us consumers.
The continued refusal by government to scrap the system will affect the performance of the ANC in the local government elections in 2016 in particular Gauteng, we call upon the ANC to rein in their deployees in Governmet not to comprise the movement. The ANC in Gauteng resolved during their Provincial Conference to scrap the system and further said deployees must listen to the leadership of the ANC and even the ANC at national has not contradicted the Gauteng ANC this policy positions, whose class interest are being pushed by ANC deployees.
SAMWU does not believe that the dispensations as presented address labour’s call which was not ambiguous but clearly called for the total scrapping of this system. We firmly believe that this is privatisation of our national roads and should be treated as such. SAMWU therefore call on all South Africans to continue with their boycott of against privatisation of our nation’s roads.
