By Kouthar Sambo

The City of Cape Town responded to a memorandum presented by the residents of Mitchells Plain who took to the streets on Saturday, 14 October, to voice their dissatisfaction with poor service delivery and increasing tariffs.

“Eskom’s 18, 6% increase is the primary cost driver impacting the tariff. This increase is not going away, and it must be paid for. Load-shedding has caused massive revenue losses, while at the same time vandalism, theft, illegal connections (of which the City has operations almost every week to remove connections) have spiked,” said the City in response to the memorandum.

Operational costs have jumped up, explained the City, as well as the Eskom price.

“It cannot be absorbed by the City. We have absorbed as much as possible to assist our customers. It is vital that the service provision is protected,” stressed the City.

Speaking to VOC News, Protest convener Natasha Gertse said the response from the City was rather “dismissive.”

“The City is still not listening to the cries of the people, and the response contained a load of arrogance. The City is not going to listen to the people unless we, as a collective, take a stand,” expressed Gertse.

According to Gertse, the City evaded accountability.

“They are telling us that the blame is not on them and that we should blame Eskom and the national government,” added Gertse.

“I do not know what else we are going to do unless we have a mass rates boycott and group as a unit because the City is not taking the suffering of our people seriously,” reiterated Gertse.

Photo: Supplied