When the people fear the government they have tyranny, when the government fears the people, they have freedom.
Samuel Adams
GUTs: Quo Vadis?
GUTs came into being on the 24th of May 2023 at a meeting organised by the Greyton Ratepayers and Residents Organisation (GRRO). During this meeting, residents expressed their displeasure about the obvious neglect and poor services delivered to our town. As a result, a mandate was given to a task team to establish a Ratepayers Association (“RPA”) for Greyton that would explore our legal options. The initial idea was to function under the wings of GRRO but as GUTs needed a specialised constitution which would legally protect its members, it had to become an independent RPA. GUTs was thus established as an a-political association to serve all ratepayers and organisations in town as their “military wing”.
With its focus on legal disputes and actions against the municipality, GUTs is the proverbial “man with a hammer” (we unfortunately have only one tool, which is a hammer – referring to the Law and our legal remedies). We admit that we also need the “toolkits” of the other Community groups in town. But when a problem cannot be solved in any other way, you can call the man with the hammer! Of course, not all problems can be fixed with a hammer. But there are situations where a hammer is needed and where ONLY a hammer will do the job.
So why do we need an RPA like GUTs?
In martial arts I was taught a very interesting secret. I was taught that we don’t practice martial arts to win fights. We practice martial arts primarily so that we don’t have to get involved in fights.
Samuel Adams said, ‘When the people fear the government they have tyranny, when the government fears the people, they have freedom.’ Adams explained that Governments are established by good people with good intentions. But then, certain men with bad intentions get into government… In our day and age every town need the presence of “a man with a hammer” to keep corrupt and opportunistic officials and politicians at bay. We had word from several sources that our presence and actions so far indeed did instil a lot of fear…
During the past year we sent several letters and even conducted a meeting with Minister Bredell and the Premier of the Western Cape, we had meetings with the town manager and our lawyer served several letters to municipal officials under threat of holding them accountable in their private capacity (“de bonus propris”) and also via joint legal tax withholding actions. We had some visible results and positive feedback. A few to mention is the turnaround time of the sewage pump trucks, which at the time took 2 weeks plus, which we got down to about two days. Also, the newly painted road markings in the main street upon entering the town done late last year before the December tourism season. We also, this far successfully, stopped the municipality’s attempt to sell off a piece of land donated for the use of Greyton’s residents.
What can GUTs do for us?
GUTs also helped several individual members with billing, electrical and stormwater issues. On the photos below our lawyer Dolf Louw, proudly displays his brand-new storm water drain built by the TWKM in front of his house in Greyton. Dolf was pleading the municipality for almost 12 years because stormwater constantly flooded his property. After starting to threaten them with a GUTs legal dispute and withholding his taxes, Dolf got instant results. He is confident that membership of GUTs has made the difference and that GUTs must keep up the pressure on TWKM to ensure residents receive the services they are rightfully paying for. The condition of the stormwater drain in front of DOLF on the photo, is the section in front of his neighbour’s house. Needless to say, his neighbour is not a GUTs member.
We hope this serves as motivation for every Greyton resident to support their own local Ratepayers union. We offer “legal wise insurance” to our members for when their complaints about services, damages and billing all fall on deaf ears.
What about a big scale collective tax action?
GUTs was far advanced in rolling out a “Legal tax action” but, because of possible winds of change after the recent elections, we were requested by our advisors that the time was not ripe for this type of joint action. Up to now we have thus not yet pulled out the big gun from our arsenal. But judging on the current circus at TWKM, the time may soon be right…
Talking about the current turmoil and power struggle at the TWK council, which is not only disrupting the entire municipality and dumping it in an even deeper financial crisis, but it is also having a serious impact on service delivery. GUTs recently joined forces with the RPA’s (Caledon, Elgin, Grabouw and Villiersdorp) to fund and successfully obtain an urgent interdict against the TWKM council. This interdict was to stop the council from having meetings where appointments and financial decisions are made until their internal situation has been stabilised. This was of course aimed at preventing corrupt politicians from further bankrupting the municipality.
The solution they don’t want you to know about…
Please remember, what GUTs really is, is an RPA geared for “worst case scenarios” such as when a municipality becomes completely dysfunctional or all service delivery collapses (as it has happened in many small towns elsewhere in the country where these towns are effectively now being managed and maintained by their RPAs). GUTs has all the know-how and legal framework in place for this kind of scenario. And if you are a pro-active person who sleeps better by being prepared for worst case situations, you will feel at home in GUTs.
The GUTs management committee agreed that the situation regarding service delivery in our town is not yet at a point where our strategy would be applicable and that we should instead at this time focus on building out and increasing our support base. We recently launched our own website to promote GUTs (have a look at https://guts.org.za).
2024-25 Membership
The GUTs management committee decided that for the coming year we will be giving a 50% discount on our annual fees reducing it to R300 per household (R25 per month). Although we would like to build up our financial reserves for future legal actions, we would currently rather encourage more residents to join GUTs. With greater representation and support, we will be able to make our voice much louder in the future and hopefully instil more respect for GUTs as a RPA. (We currently have about 20% of Greyton households as members). Of course, if some of our members can afford it, we will appreciate it if you can still pay the normal R600 annual fee. Please remember our annual membership fee is due in October 2024.
BANKING DETAILS: GUTS, FNB Acc no: 63055419080 Branch: 200212
(Please provide your surname and initials as a reference on the account of the beneficiary)
CONTACT US
To become a member OR to find out more send us an email greytontax@gmail.com.
You can also send us a WhatsApp message via any of our Whatsapp groups.
Also view our website at https://guts.org.za).
The management committee would also like to thank every member and household who supported GUTs this far and who will remain members in the future, for their loyalty.
Let’s all stand up and work together for our rights, for our town and our future!
The GUTs management committee
