Life coming back to the general freight business, says Jakavula
Leonard Neill
SPOORNET TURNED a loss of R135 million for the financial year ending March 1999 into an R85 million profit for the year ending March 2000. Better still they have recorded a profit of R135 million for the first quarter of the current year, up to the end of June.
These remarkable figures had chief executive officer Zandile Jakavula declaring that his organisation is now on the right track and that life is coming back to the general freight business when he addressed a media gathering last Friday.
The first quarter of last year had shown a loss of R141 million, and the latest figures have shown that Spoornet has taken a tough stance on past situations and its turnabout policies have paid off handsomely, said Jakavula.
This had been achieved through a strict control of expenses, and reduction in staff where this was found to be necessary. Indiscriminate retrenchments were not what he had sought, said Jakavula. Instead a thorough investigation had been taken to determine which personnel could be affected.
We found many who were actually collecting pensions but had been re-employed, and that is unfair to others who are seeking work. We dispensed with contract and casual workers and then sorted out those people who didn't really fit into our operations.
We worked closely with the trade unions and this co-operation proved highly satisfactory.
The Transnet freight division is required to be cash positive by 2000 when it will be considered for further restructuring and a possible strategic equity partner brought on board.
At the same time a full refurbishment and replacement campaign of locomotives is on the drawing board, as well as plans for the improvement of the Orex (iron ore) and Coallink (coal) services, both of which have been showing improved performance and financial results after poor results in the first half of the last financial year due to economic problems.
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