Yellow Star Manufacturing allegedly spent R14 million a year on illegal electricity

mylesillidge

mylesillidge

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Company allegedly pays "bags of cash" for illegal electricity

A Vereeniging-based metal castings producer allegedly paid Emfuleni Municipality staff bribes amounting to R14 million a year to help hook up an illegal connection and tamper with its meter readings, Sunday Times reports.

The company, Yellow Star Manufacturing (YSM), effectively cut its power bill in half through the arrangement, which was struck in 2014 after it couldn't settle a R2-million debt with the municipality.
 
How do some municipalities have electric bills upwards of 8 Billion rand? Think about it how the hell did they allow companies to consume that much power then blame the people for the bill? They always say there are on going investigations and not a single arrest or accountability from anyone. Just to put it in perspective 8 Billion rand at municipal power cost is about 3.62 Terawatt hours.

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Who used all that power? The people or industries?
 
Now check how much Eskom can generate then nothing makes sense anymore. How the hell can a municipality consume more power then Eskom can produce in almost 120 hours? It does not add up.

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Jackal46 said:
How do some municipalities have electric bills upwards of 8 Billion rand? Think about it how the hell did they allow companies to consume that much power then blame the people for the bill? They always say there are on going investigations and not a single arrest or accountability from anyone. Just to put it in perspective 8 Billion rand at municipal power cost is about 3.62 Terawatt hours.

View attachment 1804394

Who used all that power? The people or industries?
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all I know is if I don’t pay my bill then they cut me off next month here in Durban.
 
wingnut771 said:
All thieves should go to jail no matter the amount.

all I know is if I don’t pay my bill then they cut me off next month here in Durban.
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I don't think municipalities can use those amounts because Eskom can't generate it for every single municipality because will be beyond the scope of what they realistically can deliver. I think municipalities really need to ask how the hell they got to 8 Billion and so on and so forth. Obviously this is an accumulation over some time but if Eskom can only generate those amounts every 5 days even then it becomes questionable.
 
Jackal46 said:
I don't think municipalities can use those amounts because Eskom can't generate it for every single municipality because will be beyond the scope of what they realistically can deliver. I think municipalities really need to ask how the hell they got to 8 Billion and so on and so forth. Obviously this is an accumulation over some time but if Eskom can only generate those amounts every 5 days even then it becomes questionable.
Click to expand...
It happens because muni pockets the leccy sales for themselves and don’t pay Eskom and Eskom can’t do fokkal about it as it’s unconstitutional to cut off a muni as it violates human rights because the water stops working.
 
“Our proposal says all of the key municipalities that are owing Eskom need to ringfence their electricity business,” he said.

Nyati explained that the money collected gets lost when it gets in municipal accounts, and ringfencing the funds will enable municipalities to pay Eskom before putting the rest into the municipality.
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Mr Nail... meet Mr Head.

SA can do with A LOT more ringfencing of funds going through the system. A big part of the problem is that so much government revenues is just lumped into a general mishmash, and then spent on whatever. All too often, corrupt purposes.
 
Something doesn't add up here:
  • ...bribes amounting to R14 million a year...
  • ...after it couldn’t settle a R2-million debt...
  • ...effectively cut its power bill in half...never paid more than R100,000 a month...
 
G.A.S said:
Something doesn't add up here:
  • ...bribes amounting to R14 million a year...
  • ...after it couldn’t settle a R2-million debt...
  • ...effectively cut its power bill in half...never paid more than R100,000 a month...
Click to expand...
Came to say this. Bribes seem to be a losing business here.
 
Jackal46 said:
I don't think municipalities can use those amounts because Eskom can't generate it for every single municipality because will be beyond the scope of what they realistically can deliver. I think municipalities really need to ask how the hell they got to 8 Billion and so on and so forth. Obviously this is an accumulation over some time but if Eskom can only generate those amounts every 5 days even then it becomes questionable.
Click to expand...
It's the same situation in Tswane. A large part of the problem is that under ANC rule municipalities have become so disorganised and dysfunctional that they no longer have client side metering so are at the mercy of whatever Eskom says should be paid.
 
G.A.S said:
Something doesn't add up here:
  • ...bribes amounting to R14 million a year...
  • ...after it couldn’t settle a R2-million debt...
  • ...effectively cut its power bill in half...never paid more than R100,000 a month...
Click to expand...
The R2m was probably just a fraction of what they used if they were willing to pay R14m in bribes.
 
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