Councillor responds to Zuma’s address
SANDTON - Ward 102 councillor David Potter expressed scepticism on behalf of the residents of the City of Joburg following President Jacob Zuma's State of the Nation Address where mention of billing errors and poor service delivery in Johannesburg was made.
Potter said that the acknowledgement of the problems in the Johannesburg area was years too late. His primary concern was the new billing system which has affected a number of residents since 2009.
He said, “Since around 2009 the City of Johannesburg has had to deal with hundreds of thousands of billing errors emanating from the changeover to a new billing system, one that was initiated when current Mayor Parks Tau was Mayoral Head for Finance.”
He added that whilst the majority of the backlog of queries had finally been resolved – only within the last year – residents within his and other wards still contact councillors and the city in desperation to have their long-outstanding billing queries resolved.
Potter said, “As the councillor responsible for the oversight of the City’s Randburg Walk-In Centre, service delivery has improved with regards to billing query resolution. The team there has been beefed up to include officials from the various revenue departments, excluding rates. Residents are able to walk out and receive their refund or clearance certificate mostly with ease.”
Potter asked residents to contact their respective ward councillors or his office to help resolve the issues and hold the city accountable for billing errors.
He joked saying, “Maybe the president should try log a power outage with the Joburg Call Centre – holding on for the city to answer may take longer than his annual speech.”
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