02 Nov 2021

Francistown City Council has reviewed its tariffs to align them with  service delivery challenges.

The tariffs, which were last reviewed in 2016 effected on November 1 and will be reviewed every two years.

Speaking during a media briefing, recently, the mayor Mr Godisang Radisigo explained that council had to identify sources of revenue to argument the Revenue Support Grant it received from central government.

He explained that because of COVID-19, government challenged local authorities to come up with ways of generating revenue and to be self-reliant. Mr Radisigo explained that before reviewing the tariffs, the council undertook consultative meetings with the communities as well as benchmarking from other local authorities and across borders.

He explained that the law empowered the council to raise revenue from its services and any other sources to enable it to  better deliver services. He also said the council was empowered by law to set fees in consultation with its parent ministry who might further consult other relevant ministries.

“The main aim of tariffs setting is to generate sufficient revenue to ensure that there is continuous provision of services,” he added.

Mr Radisigo explained that the reasons for tariff reviews was to ascertain affordability and economic effectiveness of current tariffs, adding that the 2016 council services tariffs were past their two-year procedural review date.

Presenting the tariffs, Finance Committee chairperson, Councillor Lesego Kwambala said the review of tariffs was not limited to increasing them but the scope of review also included, decreasing, subsidising and even introducing new ones.

Mr Kwambala, who is Itekeng Ward Councillor, said three main factors used to determined fees were level of consumption, cost of service delivery and strategic decisions.

He said this was done so that tariff setting could be fair and transparent to all citizens, easy and simple to understand, adding that consumers must be able to understand how tariffs were set and how they related to service provision.  

Councillor Kwambala said in coming up with tariffs council put into consideration types of consumers they service such as domestic, commercial, industrial and institutional.

He said council would continue to identify new sources of revenue to argument budget, adding that the council was owed over P100 million.

Francistown City Council Town Clerk, Mr Lopang Pule told journalist that in an effort to improve revenue collection, council would have to strengthen its credit control unit by increasing staffing and resources. He said the objective of strengthening the unit was to ensure that those owing the council were followed up and legal action taken against defaulters.

Some of the newly introduced tariffs included that of refuse collection which had been free of charge. In SHHA areas, refuse collection will now cost P15 per yard whilst in high cost areas it will be charged P20.

Reserve parking is among the new tariffs  that have been introduced.

The cemetery charge has been increased from P160 to P400 for citizens whilst for children it has been increased from P90 to P200.

For non-citizens, the charge has been increased from P300 to P600 and non citizen children from P150 to P300. Annual rate for grave reserves will cost P200 whilst open spaces booked for political rallies will now cost P300.

The use of the council stadium by first division teams has been increased from P500 to P1 800 whilst for premier league games the charge has been increased from P1 500 to is P8 500. Ends