MEDIA RELEASE
2025-10-10
SUMMARY: The Labour Party of South Africa (Labour Party), marking International Transport Month, bemoans the near-total collapse of public transport in South Africa. The Party highlights the ongoing Transnet–CRRC locomotive dispute as a symbol of corruption and failed governance, calling for ethical leadership, genuine industrialization, and the protection of state-owned enterprises to restore public trust and efficiency.
Public transport in South Africa is not what it was – even when compared to the 1960s and 1970s. Apart from very efficient bus and local commuter systems, the South African Railways (SAR) at the time boasted state-of the art rail infrastructure, stations and rolling stock. This is now but a feint memory in the minds of most South Africans, who are forced to use dirty and hazardous forms of transport on a daily basis, or take to the heavily congested roads themselves.
Part of the collapse of the public rail transport sector in South Africa surely stems back to the longstanding dispute with the China Railway Rolling Stock Cooperation (CRRC) over locomotives and the general collapse of public transport. At the time, in 2014 the then Transnet management, with Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), concluded a contract to acquire 1064 locomotives at the value of R54, 4 billion. This is noted as one of the biggest single procurements under a state-owned company.
Locomotives are crucial to efficient railway transportation and networks, providing subsided and cost-effective transport. In theory this is consistent with a social wage, whereby all citizens (regardless of their class or social status) enjoy social benefits made possible by state funding through the fiscus.
Non-operative locomotives affect the efficiency of the movement of people and goods, having a direct negative economic impact. In the aforementioned case, many of thelocomotives delivered by CRRC were said to be non-operational due to spare parts being withheld and there not being sufficient support and maintenance for the parts.
“The money was paid and the small handful of beneficiaries profited, but the goods were gathering dust somewhere not serving South Africa”. Said interim President of the Labour Party, Joseph Mathunjwa.
In their legal papers, Transnet and the Special Investigative Unit (SIU) argued that the contract was invalid. They alleged that the procurement was based on a flawed market demand strategy (MDS), and that it contravened the duty of state-owned companies to conduct procurement processes in a fair, equitable and competitive way.
“This is the inevitable result of incompetence and corruption, whereby we have officials in honourable offices being reminded of their duty to be honourable in how they govern and execute their responsibilities -this is corruption at its best, ” Mathunjwa remarked.
A crucial argument in these papers highlighted corruption, in that OEMs have no entitlement to benefit from a procurement process which was in fact irregular and illegal.
In the mid-1900’s Union Carriage and Wagon (UWC) were set up to manufacture rolling stock in South Africa. The facility was in Nigel, today Ekurhuleni (east of Johannesburg).
Back then, the National Party prioritized local manufacturing through industrial policies and import substitution. This gave a foothold to export to neighbouring countries in Africa.
“What happened to our own capacity to build our own locomotives”, Mathunjwa asked.
“Today we buy locomotives from China. If you want to import something, rather import skills – we already have the minerals”, said Mathunjwa.
This is why the Labour Party calls for genuine industrialisation and the protection of State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs).
“It cannot be that there is youth unemployment sitting at over 60% but Transnet can buy 1064 broken locomotives for R54,4 billion”, Mathunjwa exclaimed.
“Can South Africans truly say that the recent court orders ordering the handover of the locomotive parts is a victory”, he asked. “It is not enough! South Africa deserves better leadership that doesn’t see tax-payer money as a free cheque. Ethical leadership, genuine industrialization, and beneficiation is what South Africa needs to flourish” , Mathunjwa concluded.
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