SowetanLIVE reports that Passenger Rail Agency of SA CEO Zolani Matthews says he is not confident that the railway group can provide a reliable service in the coming financial year.

Matthews was speaking at the release of the Railway Safety Regulator’s (RSR’s) state of safety report on Wednesday, which highlighted the crime and safety issues faced by the embattled railway sector. “The mainline passenger train service has not been operating as efficiently due to a lack of adequate locomotives to do that. We hope that over the course of the next 12 months we begin a service and it will not be a full service,” Matthews indicated. He went on to say: “We will gradually build that up if we have enough capacity, we also are concerned with our ability to offer a reliable continuous service that is on time and that commuters can trust, so we are not going to rush this process because we want to ensure we can provide a sustained service not just on mainline but on all corridors in all regions.” The RSR report indicated that there had been decreased levels of safety incidents in general, but this was because of a limited movement of trains over the past financial year due to the Covid-19 pandemic. “Theft of assets contributed a total of 79% to the overall security-related incidents recorded during the 2020/21 reporting period. The number of theft of assets recorded in 2020/21 is 11% lower compared to the 2019/20 reporting period, but 108% higher than 2013/14 and 60% higher since 2010/11,” according to the report.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Karabo Ledwaba at SowetanLIVE

Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page