Transnet Port Terminals (TPT) chief executive Nozipho Sithole has given Cape Town port management two months to deal with ongoing congestion issues.
Addressing port users in Cape Town last week, Sithole undertook to return to the city in July not only to assess the situation at the port but also give feedback to stakeholders.
“We must fix this,” she said. “We must get an improvement in the performance at this port.” Accompanied by senior management, Sithole also did a walkabout at the port, observing what was going on and identifying problems. “Our container terminals in Durban were performing dismally for lack of a better word,” she said, and while the situation was not yet perfect, major improvements had been made through an ongoing turnaround strategy.
“We are going to walk this terminal and observe what is going on. If the RTGs and cranes need a different maintenance plan then that is what we will do. We have done it in Durban with a reasonable amount of success,” she said. “In Durban, we have pulled the reliability of assets up from 56% to 89%.”
Sithole said the team responsible for Durban’s turnaround would work closely with Cape Town port management in coming weeks as equipment, maintenance programmes, shift rosters and management performance came under the spotlight. Cape Town port users have been up in arms for months over ongoing delays at the port where congestion on both the land and water side has been impacting them severely.
Equipment is believed to have been at the heart of the terminal’s inability to cope. Pamela Yoyo, Cape Town Port terminals manager, shared some of the initiatives that would be undertaken at the port over the next months as part of the turnaround strategy.
“In the coming weeks, we will be reinstating the local frequent weekly productivity wash ups with customers,” she said. “This will allow us to be in conversation with our customers on a weekly basis to assess what we did right, what we did wrong and what we could have done differently. This will allow us to continuously improve what we are doing.”
She said robust change management initiatives would be implemented, while the Code of Trade principles for opening and closing of stacks would be reinstated from June this year.
“We will also increase our human resource capacity for both maintenance and operations going forward.” Several of the RTGs would be refurbished and equipment from other terminals redeployed to Cape Town as necessary and as required.
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Durban’s turnaround team will work closely with Cape Town port management in coming weeks. – Nozipho Sithole
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We will increase our human resource capacity for both maintenance and operations. – Pamela Yoyo
