The establishment of a new entity to run Durban’s troubled municipal bus service will not take place at the start of July as had been promised.
A statement released by the eThekwini Metro Municipality on Wednesday said plans to establish a municipal bus service had been placed on hold.
The municipality said it put the plans on hold following a request from the province’s newly appointed transport MEC Mxolisi Kaunda.
"The Municipality has to respond to two new developments which are the appointment of a new MEC for Transport, Community Safety and Liaison in KwaZulu-Natal, who has requested to be given sufficient time to look into the matter."
The other matter that first needed to be attended to was the letter from the National Treasury asking for more information about the mooted municipal entity to run the bus service.
The municipality said it had completed all the necessary arrangements for the establishment of the municipal entity.
"We have to be realistic in our plans and recognise that attending to the two matters will impact on the deadline of 1 July 2016, but this is not an indication that the City is reneging on its commitment of setting up a municipal entity," the municipality said.
The service, operated by Tansnat Africa CC, a company owned by President Jacob Zuma’s taxi-boss nephew Mandla Gcaba, has made headlines for failing to pay its staff on time.
Since the beginning of February, the service, which carries some two-million passengers every month, has been run by an intervention team from KPMG, the auditing firm.
At an emergency session of the eThekwini Metro municipality’s executive committee on January 22, Municipal Manager S’bu Sithole revealed that the municipality had been forced to fork out R33-million to keep the service afloat.
He said then that R16-million had to be paid into the provident fund of Tansnat CC workers to prevent it from being liquidated, while a further R17.9-million had to be paid to the workers of the bus service to cover their December salaries and bonuses.
The bus service was sold by the municipality in 2003 to Remant Alton Land Transport for R70-million. In 2008 the municipality spent R405-million buying back the buses from the troubled Remant Alton. The company continued to operate the service owned by the municipality for another year.
In 2009, Tansnat was appointed to run the buses, but the service has been less than satisfactory, with the municipality having to inject extra funding.
Tansnat has struggled to keep the service operating and has also been sued by the municipality.
For its part Tansnat claimed the city owes it money in unpaid subsidies.