eMalahleni mayor’s job comes at a risk

For eMalahleni mayor Conny Nkalitshana, serving the community with diligence is a double-edged sword – a choice between being too sympathetic to their plight, to taking drastic action by cutting off those making no effort to pay for public services.

All this while losing R20 million a month to copper cable theft, widespread illegal electricity connections and the vandalism of infrastructure.

Eskom debt

The coal-rich municipality owes power utility Eskom a whopping R7.6 billion, which includes a monthly interest of R40 million. She said the non-payment of services was at the core of the municipality’s financial woes.

In an interview with The Citizen, Nkalitshana spoke about the impact of the non-payment of services, increased illegal electricity connections, the transformer and dealing with challenges faced by the municipality.

Illegal connections

eMalahleni is the second-highest contributor to Mpumalanga’s GDP (gross domestic product). Reflecting on the challenges, she said: “Our biggest problem is non-payment of services – especially on the western side, where those that pay do not exceed 20%.

“There are strategies the municipality is enforcing, but we encounter resistance from the people of eMalahleni – people not paying for services.

“The other challenge is the issue of illegal connections – connecting electricity illegally and overloading the transformer. We know how many households we have, but they are selling electricity to informal settlements.

ALSO READ: Motorists warned to steer clear of N4 near eMalahleni as protests rage on

Informal settlements

“Last year, we had about 61 informal settlements. Currently, we are sitting at 75 with eMalahleni attracting anyone around South Africa because of the job opportunities associated with mining and power stations.

 “Everyone comes here, a development creating the advent of more informal settlements – people from Lesotho. We have discovered that our formal households sell informal settlements the electricity at a rate of R500 a month. When we cut off power, the community revolts against us,” she said.  

Infrastructure

Nkalitshana said eMalahleni had old infrastructure which requires an overhaul.

“Even with our old infrastructure, our community taps in there illegally making it impossible for other people to access water. There are areas with no regular water supplies for years.

“We have already exhausted the term of drawing water from the Witbank Dam in line with our municipal licence conditions.

“This is why we have resolved to access other schemes like Tugela to supply the community with water,” she added.

“It is all about illegal connections, vandalism, theft of copper cables and low payment rates – making the municipality not function optimally.

Theft

 “The money we lose through theft of copper cables is estimated at over R20 million a month. This is money we could be using to reduce the Eskom debt.

“Revenue collected from residents for services is far less than what we’re getting. With this vandalism – just talking one sewer plant cabling and servicing of a transformer, they attacked our technical staff. This makes it very dangerous to work, with damages estimated at R22 million,” she said.

ALSO READ: Tshwane mayor to propose R1 billion allocation for electricity, water infrastructure