23 Sep 2020

Lobatse mayor Mr Essop Pandor has expressed concern over slow payment of council rates and encouraged the town’s community to pay rates on time to avoid action being taken against them.

In his address to a full council meeting on September , Mr Pandor stated that revenue collection by Lobatse Town Council was slow for the first five months of this financial year.

He said around P2.7 million was collected by end of August, which was just 15 per cent of the total estimate for the financial year.

“The scenario portrays a slow kick off and we need to intensify our collection rate and devise new strategies to improve our revenue collection,” Mr Pandor said.

The mayor explained that council had completed rates billing and started invoicing customers.

He asked councilors to encourage residents in their wards who owe council rates and sanitation fees to pay.

The mayor warned that if the trend of non-payment continued, council would be forced to take further action.

“As you are aware, when our collection improves, we will be able to provide services to the people,” he said.

Mr Pandor also asked council to reprioritise its budget, without compromising service delivery.

He said the council was operating at a reduced budget of just over P112.8 million revenue support grant plus an estimated P17.6 million revenue collection for this financial year.

“You will recall during the month of March 2020 our (national) budget for both recurrent and development was reduced and in that effect the Lobatse Town Council revenue support grant (RSG) was affected. Our RSG was reduced by P6.5m from a ceiling of P119.4m,” he said.

Concerning major projects in the town, Mr Pandor said the bus and taxi rank project had been completed.

Construction of the project started last year in November and  the facility was opened to the public in July.

He further said construction of a modern shopping mall at the bus and taxi rank was ongoing.

“Construction of the mall has been awarded to Sharps Construction Company and has been duly handed over the site on 22 July. Mobilisation to the site has been fully done, hoarding of the site is complete and the earthworks have since commenced,” he said.

The project is a public-private partnership between Lobatse Town Council and property development company Time Projects.

Regarding construction of the pedestrian bridge at the railway crossing adjacent to the town centre, Mr Pandor said the project was slightly behind schedule.

“The project has experienced some delays in implementation due to COVID-19 and a total of 58 working days were lost during the mandatory lock downs.

The revised completion date for project is now April 2021,” he said. Ends