Buffalo City ratepayers march to City Hall, demanding withdrawal of ‘unaffordable’ electricity fee

By Johnnie Isaac

11 Jul 2024

A monthly maintenance network surcharge of between R376 and R760 came into effect on 1 July.

About 200 people from 50 wards under Buffalo City Metro marched to the municipality’s offices at the East London City Hall on Wednesday to try to persuade the mayor not to introduce a maintenance fee.

As the municipality’s four-month “free pass” for residents who used electricity through illegal connections by tampering with their meters also came to an end, the new tariffs kicked in last week. Households are now paying a 12% electricity tariff hike, coupled with a monthly maintenance network surcharge of between R376 and R760.

Many ratepayers are complaining that the new tariffs are unaffordable and place more financial strain on poor and working-class households.

On Wednesday, protesters handed over a memorandum of grievances and a petition to Mayor Princess Faku.

Consumers in the dark

March organiser Leonard Ncumbese said that municipal officials often refused to provide residents with detailed breakdowns of their bills, leaving consumers in the dark about how they accrued large debts.

Sandra Schroeder, of the social housing provider Own Haven Housing Association, said the additional service fee was detrimental to non-profit organisations providing affordable rentals for low-income earners.

She explained that their organisation would need to pay an additional R500,000 a month due to the lack of special tariff provisions for social housing in Buffalo City. She said they received special provisions in metros like the City of Cape Town and Nelson Mandela Bay, where they also operated.

“Our tenants cannot afford the R432 service fee that Buffalo City is charging. Our tenants are already struggling, and we cannot recover this cost from them, meaning it will come out of our pockets,” said Schroeder.

DA councillor and caucus leader in the city council, Sue Bentley, has written to Eastern Cape Finance MEC Mlungisi Mvoko, through DA Shadow Finance MEC Dr Malcolm Figg, to express her concerns about the lack of public participation in the budget.

“We don’t believe there was meaningful public participation in the budget process, which is illegal. We want the Finance MEC to investigate because the budget process was flawed, and therefore these increases are also flawed,” Bentley said.

Read more in Daily Maverick: City of Johannesburg changes tune over R200 prepaid electricity surcharge

Jerome Mdyolo, the Eastern Cape leader of Al Jama-ah, accused the metro of violating the Municipal Financial Management Act and the Municipal Systems Act, which mandates citizen consultation before the council passes the budget.

Outside City Hall, protesters demanded to see Faku, but she was not available. Buffalo City Metro spokesperson Samkelo Ngwenya said that Faku had declined to meet the protesters to avoid being humiliated. He said that the metro was conducting roadshows and visiting wards to explain the new tariffs while assisting individuals and businesses.

“We have provisions for households with incomes of up to R4,400 per month, including elderly rebates and packages for senior citizens and businesses. We are going ward to ward to convince people to avoid unnecessary rates boycotts,” said Ngwenya.

Protesters warned that they would disrupt mayoral events until she met with them. DM

First published by GroundUp.

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Consumers in the dark