Potholes cost Sanral over R15m

Sanral has paid out R15m to claimants whose vehicles were damaged by potholes on national roads in the past two years.

Transport minister Barbara Creecy revealed this during a parliamentary question by Rise Mzansi's Makashule Gana.

According to Creecy, a total of R15,7m was paid by South African National Roads Agency Limited to 116 claimants for pothole damage on the country’s national roads between 2022/23 and 2024/25.

Gana said they were concerned that despite the number of claims reducing in number over the stated period, the amounts paid out have increased sharply.

“For example, in 2022/23 there were 53 claims paid out to the value of almost R1.2m, while in 2024/25, thus far, with just over half the number [27] of claims, almost R14m has been paid out.

“The above figures only relate to claims made on the country’s national routes maintained and managed by Sanral, and therefore do not include claims made to provinces and municipalities.

Gana said potholes on the country’s national roads could, in part, be directly linked to the collapse of the rail network and an increased number of trucks used to move goods and services to and from the country’s ports.

“Moreover, potholes pose a danger to commuters and increase the cost of doing business. At the next available opportunity, I will ask the minister of transport to brief the Portfolio Committee on work being done to deal with potholes, and other road damage, that are the result of poor workmanship and/or the growing number of trucks using the national road network,” Gana said.

SowetanLIVE