COSATU welcomes Cabinet committee on GFIP but still says NO to e-tolls
The Congress of South African Trade Unions welcomes the decision by the Cabinet to appoint a special committee to be chaired by Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe to co-ordinate all work around the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project (GFIP), involving the ministers of transport, finance, public enterprises, performance monitoring and evaluation, and director general in the Presidency.
COSATU expects that this committee will work closely with the joint ANC/COSATU Task Team, which has already been researching alternative models for funding road construction and improvements. We are confident that it will find a more equitable and efficient model than e-tolling, which has become so discredited, unpopular and impractical.
The federation agrees with Minister of Performance Monitoring and Evaluation, Collins Chabane, that "decisions taken on the GFIP will have implications for how future infrastructure projects are financed". It is therefore not just a matter concerning Gauteng residents, but the funding of all future road improvements throughout the country.
COSATU fully agrees that the government must act responsibly, and ensure it and state-owned enterprises honour their financial obligations timeously, and that "nothing compromises the huge infrastructure programme which is crucial for raising the level of South Africa's economic growth, and for raising the standard of living of citizens, especially the poor and unemployed."
The federation will insist however that e-tolling is no longer an option and that other ways to meet the government's objectives must be found.
As we said in our May Day statement, "Tolling forces drivers to pay huge amounts of extra money just to travel on the province's previously free highways. Workers face having to pay out hundreds of extra rands every month just to travel to and from work, not from choice but because in the absence of reliable public transport, their car is their only way to get to work.
"Consumers face massive price increases as a result of the extra cost of transporting goods to the shops being passed on to the shoppers - quite possibly adding on a little more. These increases which were to be come on top of those already imposed this month in the form of higher electricity tariffs and petrol prices."
COSATU is working closely with the ANC to find better, alternative funding models and will work with government to assist them to resolve this problem.
Statement issued by Patrick Craven, COSATU national spokesperson, May 4 2012
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