Cape Town: Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has requested the President Cyril Ramaphosa to announce major reforms for the management of Ports, Passenger Rail and Policing during the State of the Nation Address (SONA).
SONA 2025 address will take place on Thursday, Feb 06, 2025. The event will result in a number of road closures and restrictions and some of these will remain in place until Feb 19, 2025.
The address will consider three critical reforms at top of Cape Town’s advocacy agenda for the Government of National Unity, such as the greater private sector involvement in running the Port of Cape Town.
It also considers more policing powers for municipal officers to help SAPS fight gang, gun and drug crime, while developing Cape Town’s passenger rail operations for the City of run.
Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis said that they can generate huge economic benefits in the region by fixing the port of the Cape Town, passenger rail and policing. The Government of National Unity (GNU) has a golden chance to drive job-creating reforms this year and will close watching President Ramaphosa’s SONA for news on these fronts.
However, port of Cape Town is ranked worst in the world for efficiency and there is no doubt that private sector partners could turn this around. It is an efficient port that will raise exports of local products and create jobs in these industries.
According to Lewis, they were disappointed that the port is not among a batch of Transnet projects, coming up for private sectors investment injections by June in 2025. They need clear and urgent deadline for private sector involvement in Cape Town’s port operations.
Mayor Lewis said on policing that the City of Cape Town was calling for the devolution of criminal investigative powers so that the officers can help building prosecution-ready case dockets and gain convictions particularly for gang, gun, drug and extortion-related crime.
The immediate boost for the criminal investigation capacity of the State can be achieved by the Police Minister issuing regulations under the SAPS Act. They are also called for the upcoming batch of SAPS Act amendments to include a change to section 64E(c) empowering municipal officers to investigate crime. They can take far more guns and drugs off the streets and gain convictions, if we are able to offer more help to SAPS investigations and prosecutors.
Commenting on passenger rail, City of Cape Town called for a clear deadline on devolving the train service for capable metros to run. City is all set to have complete business plans in place by mid-2025 to take over the management of passenger rail services following the completion of Cape Town’s Rail Feasibility Study last year.
Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis said that in 2025, Cape Town will be ready to take over running of passenger rail with complete business plans in place. They awaits for President’s update on the status of the long-delayed National Devolution Strategy.
Taking charge of Metrorail is urgent for lower income households, who would save an estimated R932m a year if trains were working as they should. They have a vision to massively scale up passenger numbers, new train sets, new routes and to upgrade stations and surrounding areas with affordable housing over the next two decades.