Prasa Responds To The Article By Rapport
The Article by Rapport on PRASA’s new trains is nothing but an on-going onslaught and attempt to undermine the work of government to bring dignity to rail passenger travel.
It is unfortunate that the article by Johan Eybers, published in the Rapport newspaper on Sunday, 14 January 2018, has been deliberately sensationalised with the sole of intention of causing panic to the public and discredit the work that our government, through PRASA is doing to offer a more dignified travel experience to the South African commuter, who is predominantly black.
What the journalist deliberately did not comment on was that PRASA is undoing years of underinvestment in passenger rail infrastructure which was a scheme by the previous regime to ignore the needs of a millions of commuters that use the train on a daily basis.
What this journalist did not write about was the fact that the infrastructure is 50 years old, bringing a lot of frustration and ‘pain’ to the commuter. The cancellations and delays that our commuters are experiencing everyday are as a result of trains that are ‘so oud soos die berge’ and the infrastructure that was left to the point of dilapidation thus needing complete overhaul at millions of tax payers money.
This is what this journalist was scared to confront; the complicity of the previous regime in the denigration of the traveling masses.
Even after Meneer Eybers was given a dignified response by PRASA which included, amongst others, a visit to the mock-up train at Pretoria Station, a train ride on the Pienaarspoort-Pretoria corridor in order for him to have a first-hand experience of the modernisation work current underway, he paid scant regard to the facts presented to him by Ms Nana Zenani (PRASA’s Group Communications Senior Manager). A trip to the train manufacturing factory did not help Mr Eybers in dealing with his own preconceived notion on our capacity to deliver on Prasa’s modernisation program.
Through government’s injection of R172 billion in modernising the long-overdue passenger rail infrastructure, which includes station upgrades, perway improvement (to reduce time travelled), re-signalling, PRASA is alleviating the ‘pain’ experiences by commuters inflicted by the previous regime. This is the pain that Meneer Eyber should be dealing with.
What was presented to Meneer Eybers are the following:
1. The re-signaling programme has as its sole purpose the guarantee of the safety of the commuters which will reduce if not eliminate train accidents.
2. Platform rectification that, amongst other purposes, ensures universal access onto the train even those who are physically disabled and use wheel chairs to board the trains.
3. Platform rectification has nothing to do with the new trains. Most stations were not meeting the international standard specifications even for the current fleet and these stations were built decades ago by the previous regime.
We also fail to understand what pain that the new trains will inflict onto the commuters, except comfort and dignified travel experience.
If Meneer Eybers was referring to the inconvenience as a result of corridor occupation during modernization, than he must missed the following point raised during his visit to Prass’s train environment:
1. During the modernisation programme certain corridors are occupied but this is done in the least disruptive manner so as to minimize any inconveniences that might be caused to the commuter.
2. This occupation of certain corridors will continue for as long as Prasa is busy with upgrade of rail infrastructure and to this effect alternative arrangements are always made for commuters to continue with their journey.
3. Lastly, the actual new train which is being deployed by Prasa meets all of the standard specification and the safety critical is elements for passenger trains.
On the contrary, had this journalist bothered to ask the commuters on the train that he was traveling with, he would have received a different response. That’s the response he did not want to hear as he woauld have been obliged to share in his article. Unlike the trains that were classified according to race by the previous regime, where black passengers were only good for third class cabin, the new PRASA train gives passengers a first class experience regardless of race, colour or creed. This is the truth that Meneer Eybers did not have the courage to confront.
Deal with your demons Meneer Eybers, says Dr. Sipho Sithole of the Passenger Rail Agency.
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