The Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance (Outa) believes there are “reasonably strong reasons to appeal” the High Court’s decision to dismiss their application to abandon controversial e-tolling.
After Judge Louis Vorster ruled in favour of the e-tolling on Gauteng freeways on December 13, HumanIPO reported that Outa promised the fight is not over in the the South African e-tolling battle.
Now OUTA will decide today whether they will appeal the high court’s decision to dismiss an application requesting the scrapping of e-tolling on the Gauteng freeways.
“We have studied the judgement and will meet with our legal team tomorrow to discuss what route we are going to take,” said Wayne Duvenhage, Chairman of Outa yesterday.
The high court in Pretoria dismissed a claim by Outa suggesting the South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) maintained a deliberate strategy keeping the public uninformed and that public participation was not executed adequately.
After dismissing Outa’s claim, the High Court ordered them to pay all the legal costs related to the application. Outa will also decide today whether they will appeal these costs together with the application appeal this afternoon.
The organisations that expressed disappointment in the High Court’s ruling include the Automobile Association of South Africa (AA), the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), the Democratic Alliance (DA), the Freedom Front Plus (FF+) and the Justice Project of South Africa.
E-tolling had been set back on April 28 when the high court ruled that a full review needed to implemented before e-tolling could commence. The system experienced another setback when the African National Congress postponed a parliamentary debate in November.
