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Pretoria - Taxpayers will be asking the court's assistance to find out how much their municipalities owe Eskom.
Jaap Kelder, spokesperson for the National Taxpayers Union, says the Eskom accounts of various rural towns are in arrears and residents fear that their municipalities could have total blackouts.
Paulpietersburg, Kroonstad and Warrenton are on the point of having Eskom disconnect their electricity, declares Kelder.
He says that local taxpayers' attempts to get information from Eskom as to exactly how much money their municipality owes have been fruitless.
Many municipalities re-sell electricity to residents. But now municipalities have not been paying their Eskom accounts and consequently Eskom could cut off an entire town's power - even that of households that pay religiously.
Danie Eichstädt, chairperson of the Dihlabeng Residents Association (DRA) in Bethlehem in the Free State, recently asked Eskom's client manager in Bloemfontein for information about his local authority's record of payments.
Eskom's response, which Sake24 has seen, is that it (Eskom) has a written and signed agreement to supply the Dihlabeng municipality with electricity and it may therefore not disclose any client information to a third party.
Kelder says the situation is intolerable, and the Promotion of Access to Information Act will be studied to discover if a court application for disclosure can be made.
Eichst&uaml;dt says the DRA will support such an application.
Sake24 has established that Dihlabeng's monthly account runs to about R5m, but the municipality currently owes Eskom R12m-odd.
Eichstädt says there is a distinct possibility that Eskom will disconnect the town's electricity.
He points out that on the one hand Dihlabeng does not have enough money to pay Eskom because its own collections leave a lot to be desired, and on the other the municipality is using scrupulous payers' money to supplement its cash flow rather than pay its accounts.
- Sake24.com
For more business news in Afrikaans, go to Sake24.com.