Tshwane struggles, Joburg tops

Pretoria - With a quarter of the municipal financial year behind it, the Tshwane Metro Council has collected less than 20% of its budgeted revenue for the financial year.

This council, which hit the headlines in July when it was unable to pay its water and electricity accounts, is the worst-performing of all the Metro Councils in terms of collections.

This has become evident from a National Treasury review of municipal finances for the first quarter of the financial year. Cape Town is not doing much better, but Johannesburg is the revenue champion.

According to Treasury, all municipalities have together collected 26.2% of their budgeted income for the quarter to end-September. This figure has however been inflated by district municipalities which, thanks to overpayments by national government, have already achieved 43% of their revenue budgets.

Treasury previously predicted that the effect of the recession in this quarter would knock municipal income, but it now says that it is difficult to determine the effect of the recession on municipalities.

Among the Metro councils, Johannesburg performed best, with Ekurhuleni only a short head behind. Nelson Mandela Bay took the rear, while Tshwane and Cape Town have both committed less than 20% of their budgeted expenditure.

Consumer arrears at Metro councils are 7.3% up on the first quarter of the last financial year, and now total R31.5bn.

- Sake24.com

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