LETTER: Carol Paton is wrong about Prasa

Opinions expressed by Carol Paton, in the Business Day, Blade Nzimande is a hypocrite who doesn’t care about the working class, April 16 2019, are a reflection of a shallow appreciation of progress made by the ANC government in reversing years of disinvestment by the apartheid government in public transport, particularly on rail.

It becomes gutter journalism when a journalist expresses emotions and outbursts instead of using tools of analysis and engages in a proper debate.

The historical facts that Paton chooses to ignore are that the policy of apartheid deliberately moved the poor away from job opportunities and denied them access to amenities. It is the apartheid state that placed the burden on the workforce to travel long distances to their places of employment and commercial centres and also forced them to unsecured rail travel.

Judging from Paton’s opinion, it is apparent that her outburst is informed by her prejudiced conclusions on the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa) and its ability to change the travel experience of the poor and the working-class in SA.

It is now an open secret that the ANC government has designated rail transportation as the backbone of the public transport system in SA. As a first priority, we are committed to extending rail transportation with buses and minibus taxis as feeder services to the rail transportation system.

We have guaranteed funding of R172bn to reverse the impact of the disinvestment in rail since the mid-1980s over the next two decades. Armed with a detailed statement that transport minister Blade Nzimande released on April 11, Paton failed to comprehend the historical challenges facing our public transport system, and rail in particular. She rather scapegoated [the minister] and chose to attack [him].

Contrary to her views that, “[The Minister] has shown little interest in the problems of rail commuters”, Nzimande’s preoccupation since being appointed transport minister has been nothing but ensuring that he creates an environment conducive to the realisation of a co-ordinated, safe and affordable commuter rail.

Among Nzimande’s first tasks was to appoint a board to stabilise corporate governance. The first task of the board was to ensure that they implement recommendations by the Treasury, the auditor-general and the public protector to stabilise the entity. While focusing on governance, the board members also had to ensure that they focus on rallying all employees to be part of this new dawn.

To further exercise his oversight responsibility, Nzimande continued to get progress reports on the work done by the board to ensure that good corporate governance is restored.

Dealing with corruption

To deal with corruption, the Prasa board placed on special leave and suspension various executives on allegations of improper, irregular, and corrupt behaviour, and terminated 14 security employees who committed attempted robbery and various other offences at Prasa.

Further action will be implemented to deal with acts of maladministration, criminality, corruption and state capture.

Given these very processes, Nzimande has now decided to implement a two-fold intervention to set Prasa in motion for its renewal. The process of appointing a team of organisational experts to undertake a six- to eight-week organisational analysis of Prasa to address key factors that might have led to the failed implementation of Prasa’s initial turnaround strategies is at an advanced stage.

Subsequent to the outcome of this process, Nzimande will appoint a turnaround execution team under the direction of the department of transport to monitor and report on progress.

Nzimande will also implement immediate actions, which include the recruitment of executives with the necessary skill sets required for us to turn the entity around. These executives will undergo the State Security Agency (SSA) vetting processes.

The process of the recruitment and appointment of the substantive group CEO will also be finalised to stabilise Prasa from the top echelons of management.

The successful launch of the ground-breaking, innovative, state-of-the-art Gibela Rain train manufacturing plant by President Cyril Ramaphosa has been hailed by many as a successful part of our plans to modernise commuter rail transport.

Our national resignaling project is part of our modernisation programme to replace obsolete rail infrastructure and outdated rail technology. This includes station platform correction and station revitalisation. Our plans are in full swing to roll-out our new rolling stock, including putting in place enabling infrastructure such as the depot programme, perway and electrical works to support the deployment of the new rolling stock fleet.

We are now running test trains in Gauteng and in the Western Cape. This is a significant achievement in modernising our rail services. This, among other things, will ensure that reliability of trains, and trains cancelations, are addressed.

To protect passengers and our railway network and infrastructure, we have dedicated R72m to the building of fences and walls and the installation of alarm systems, including the deployment of security personnel in our trains.

We are further installing CCTV surveillance cameras at each station and also replacing all light-current copper cabling with fibre optics to reduce the amount of cable theft.

It is these interventions and many others that will ensure we surely turn the tide at Prasaa. Yes, the challenges are enormous but Nzimande is seriously addressing the problems at Prasa.

Ishmael Mnisi
•Spokesperson for the transport minister