Pretoria – The South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) has collected R250.8 million since the commencement of the Gauteng e-toll system last December, the agency said on Wednesday.
Sanral chief financial officer Inge Mulder said progress in registering vehicles has also been above expectation, being 1 242 317 at the end of February.
Mulder said since toll commencement, approximately 2.5 million vehicles have been identified on the Gauteng network.
Revenue of R953 million has been recorded. However, Mulder said the revenue represents the nominal value of transactions, excluding VAT.
The values have not been adjusted in terms of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), which require the amount to be fair valued and impaired, if applicable.
The values are subject to change during the financial year end process, and will still be reviewed by the Auditor-General for accuracy and completeness. No provision for bad debt has been included.
However, Mulder also pointed out that it was important for people to understand that tolling was not only about collecting money to maintain roads and service debt. “It’s also about optimising road based transport,” she said.
The current debt is R39.8 billion as issued under the Domestic Medium Term Note programme (DMTN: HWAY and NRA) and the historical SZ bonds.
The same figures were also shared with the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Transport, where Sanral had clarified that it had registered and non-registered users.
The agency’s CEO Nazir Alli said: “We made Parliament understand that there were no major issues with registered users and that of the 1.2 million registered users, 964 886 (77%) users had purchased an e-tag, with the remainder of 277 431 (23%) opting for the Vehicle Licence Number plate registration.
“We also conceded to Parliament that where we have issues is with unregistered users and the majority of queries included cloned number plates and vehicles without number plates which we are attending to as a matter of priority and is being done in conjunction with the Department of Transport.”
Alli said they reject the insinuations that have been made by their opponents that these figures are inaccurate.
“We have no reason to manipulate these figures because we are audited by the Auditor-General and that is good enough for investors because they really want to know if the cash flows generated by the project will yield a good return on their investment,” he said. - SAnews.gov.za
