Transnet Freight Rail has 30,000 employees. What do they all do? Not much, is the answer.
28 October 2022 - 13:27
byRob Tiffin
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A few week ago, before the Transnet strike, driving between Cape Town and Potchefstroom I saw exactly two trains on the 1,300km of excellent condition railway lines. At the same time on the N1 road I estimated that about 600 trucks passed me on the way down to Cape Town.
Why are no trains running? There is no incentive to run them. Salaries get paid every month — jobs for all are protected. All the professional government and state-owned enterprise career managers who have no railway skills but check all the right demographic boxes face a few uncomfortable meetings at parliament, where they just make plausible excuses, such as the floods in KwaZulu-Natal and vandalism.
The handout arrives, as government can’t see that its policies of bloated employment, black economic empowerment and employment equity do not work. If there is taxpayers’ money to fund it, so be it.
Transnet Freight Rail has 30,000 employees. What do they all do? Not much, is the answer, as it’s manning fixed infrastructure whether utilised or not, trains that are idle or broken still have drivers sitting at home. The perfect government job.
To build this railway infrastructure would require many hundreds of billions of rand, yet it sits idle as a stark monument to the failure of state ownership in railways. The rot in the railways started in the early 1980s when the then SA Railways lost its monopoly on inland routes as they were inefficient and bloated.
It never reinvented itself like the American and Canadian railway systems, which drastically cut staff numbers and turned the business around to compete with the trucks and become profitable again.
In SA the old guard of skilled railwaymen and lots of dead wood made way for unskilled employees who ticked boxes — and a lot more dead wood. Now the last of those railway men have retired and it’s in free fall.
Transnet Freight Rail CEO Siza Mzimela, who has a chequered history in transport, does not believe control has been lost. But she has never actually gained control, and billions will now be spent because of pride and outdated policies based on dogma. Meanwhile, the taxpayers see their assets disappear.
Rob Tiffin, Cape Town
JOIN THE DISCUSSION: Send us an email with your comments to letters@businesslive.co.za. Letters of more than 300 words will be edited for length. Anonymous correspondence will not be published. Writers should include a daytime telephone number.
Support our award-winning journalism. The Premium package (digital only) is R30 for the first month and thereafter you pay R129 p/m now ad-free for all subscribers.
LETTER: Why are no trains running?
Transnet Freight Rail has 30,000 employees. What do they all do? Not much, is the answer.
A few week ago, before the Transnet strike, driving between Cape Town and Potchefstroom I saw exactly two trains on the 1,300km of excellent condition railway lines. At the same time on the N1 road I estimated that about 600 trucks passed me on the way down to Cape Town.
Why are no trains running? There is no incentive to run them. Salaries get paid every month — jobs for all are protected. All the professional government and state-owned enterprise career managers who have no railway skills but check all the right demographic boxes face a few uncomfortable meetings at parliament, where they just make plausible excuses, such as the floods in KwaZulu-Natal and vandalism.
The handout arrives, as government can’t see that its policies of bloated employment, black economic empowerment and employment equity do not work. If there is taxpayers’ money to fund it, so be it.
Transnet Freight Rail has 30,000 employees. What do they all do? Not much, is the answer, as it’s manning fixed infrastructure whether utilised or not, trains that are idle or broken still have drivers sitting at home. The perfect government job.
To build this railway infrastructure would require many hundreds of billions of rand, yet it sits idle as a stark monument to the failure of state ownership in railways. The rot in the railways started in the early 1980s when the then SA Railways lost its monopoly on inland routes as they were inefficient and bloated.
It never reinvented itself like the American and Canadian railway systems, which drastically cut staff numbers and turned the business around to compete with the trucks and become profitable again.
In SA the old guard of skilled railwaymen and lots of dead wood made way for unskilled employees who ticked boxes — and a lot more dead wood. Now the last of those railway men have retired and it’s in free fall.
Transnet Freight Rail CEO Siza Mzimela, who has a chequered history in transport, does not believe control has been lost. But she has never actually gained control, and billions will now be spent because of pride and outdated policies based on dogma. Meanwhile, the taxpayers see their assets disappear.
Rob Tiffin, Cape Town
JOIN THE DISCUSSION: Send us an email with your comments to letters@businesslive.co.za. Letters of more than 300 words will be edited for length. Anonymous correspondence will not be published. Writers should include a daytime telephone number.
LETTER: Masondo’s concerns on unlocking private sector role in rail should be heeded
Kumba cuts export forecasts after Transnet disruptions
Transnet allocated almost R6bn for repair and maintenance of infrastructure
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