Crippled by extensive vandalism said to have cost it an estimated R4bn in the past few years, the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa) has launched an intelligence-driven plan aimed at protecting its assets.
The plan, launched on Wednesday by transport minister Fikile Mbalula, hinges on intelligence gathering, analysis and co-ordination; proactive, combative and reactive approaches as well as the insourcing of 3,100 security officers to beef up Prasa’s security unit, among others.
Prasa is among state-owned enterprises that have been hollowed out by years of corruption and mismanagement linked to state capture.
The rail agency, which has had five turnaround strategies implemented since its creation in 2009, registered irregular expenditure of R27.2bn in 2018/2019. It received a disclaimer from the auditor-general in 2019.
In May, Prasa announced that it was facing a “debilitating cash-flow crunch” after failing to pay R23m to employees’ retirement fund benefits for the previous two months. The state-owned enterprise said it was considering job cuts through voluntary severance packages to ease its financial woes.
Prasa has lost R199m since the start of the Covid-19 lockdown in March. The revenue loss now projected for 2020 is R757m.
This poor financial performance has been made worse by rampant theft and sabotage of its infrastructure and assets, pushing security and law enforcement agencies in the country — such as the SA Police Service (SAPS), the Hawks, the National Prosecuting Authority and the metro police — to join the utility in drafting the plan.
The Railway Safety Regulator (RSR), mandated to oversee railway safety operations, was also part of the initiative that Mbalula launched.
Prasa has had its trains torched and copper cables and rail track stolen, resulting in train derailments and fatalities across the country.
In its state of safety report for 2018/2019, the RSR said there were 375 fatalities due to “operational occurrences” during the period under review, and 873 train collisions and 370 derailments, among other incidents.
Mbalula bemoaned the crime in the sector, equating it to economic sabotage.
“Theft and vandalism of critical infrastructure in our railways not only place the lives and livelihoods of those who rely on trains in danger, but also have dire consequences for the economy,” he said.
In the 2018/2019 financial year, Prasa spent no less than R700m on outsourced security, and that intervention had “clearly not worked”, Mbalula said.
“The Prasa integrated security plan we are launching ... has been in operation since mid-August and has already recorded successes. In August, the SAPS and Prasa protection services arrested six men in possession of copper cables and signalling equipment worth over R5.5m,” said Mbalula.
“This is an intelligence-driven plan that will enable us to find these criminals wherever they hide, in their homes, in their communities, in their workplaces.”
Law-enforcement authorities have also arrested two Prasa employees and a former worker who were caught with the rail agency’s assets worth over R2m.
Prasa’s accounting authority, Badisa Matshego, said their efforts to turn around Prasa would be futile if their assets were not protected.
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