On 11 April 2024 SANRAL switched off the electronic toll (e-Toll) system that had operated on Gauteng freeways since 2013. The move ends a programme that consistently fell short of its financial goals and sparked a decade of legal challenges.
e-Toll was an electronic collection method that used large metal gantries to read vehicle tags and charge drivers for using certain highways. The system was introduced to fund the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project, but compliance, the share of drivers actually paying, never rose above 40 per cent in 2014 and fell to roughly 20 per cent by 2019. According to the Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance (OUTA), the scheme therefore generated only between R55 million and R70 million a month, far below the amounts projected when the tolls were first announced.
The low take-up rate reflected widespread public opposition. An economic impact assessment commissioned by the Gauteng provincial government in 2014 recorded that 98 % of responding businesses and community groups opposed e-Toll, describing it as unaffordable, inequitable and overly bureaucratic. The assessment concluded that the toll system placed a disproportionate burden on low- and middle-income households while offering limited benefit to the provincial economy.
OUTA, founded by former Avis CEO Wayne Duvenage, led a series of court actions against SANRAL and the National Treasury. The Supreme Court ruled against OUTA in 2012 and again in 2013, but the latter judgment allowed individual motorists to challenge summonses in court. This legal avenue enabled OUTA to represent non-paying motorists and to encourage broader non-compliance.
In March 2019, just months before national elections, SANRAL announced it would stop issuing summonses for unpaid e-Toll debts. Duvenage described that decision as the “deathblow” for the scheme, suggesting the government wanted to avoid further voter backlash.
With the system offline, drivers and businesses no longer need to budget for monthly e-Toll charges. However, the shutdown also removes a revenue stream that was intended to fund road upgrades, leaving SANRAL to seek alternative financing methods for the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project.
For companies operating in Gauteng, the immediate effect is a reduction in operating costs tied to toll compliance. Longer-term implications will depend on how the government replaces the lost revenue and whether new funding mechanisms will affect future infrastructure projects.
Read more about the regulatory context in our Regulatory & Policy coverage.
Wayne Duvenage recalled that the e-Toll programme was conceived after Gauteng’s highways were officially declared toll roads in 2008, a move that set the stage for the later construction of the gantry infrastructure. Work on the metal gantries began in 2010, sparking the first wave of public outcry that would later fuel the formation of the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse. Although the physical gantries remain on the roads, the electronic readers have been disabled since the system was switched off, meaning they no longer capture tag data or trigger billing events for motorists travelling the Gauteng network.
The 2014 economic impact assessment commissioned by the Gauteng provincial government captured a striking 98 % opposition rate among responding businesses and community groups, a figure that underscored the depth of resistance to the scheme. The assessment’s two key findings highlighted that, while the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project did deliver some provincial economic benefit, the e-Toll model was deemed unaffordable and inequitable. Those conclusions fed directly into OUTA’s strategy of encouraging non-compliance, reinforcing the perception that the tolls would not endure beyond the next electoral cycle.
Compliance peaked at roughly 40 % in 2014, a level reached amid threats of criminal prosecution and the withholding of vehicle licence renewals, according to OUTA’s records. After that high point, the compliance rate slipped to about 20 % by 2019, limiting monthly revenue to between R55 million and R70 million. The steep decline reflected both the growing public refusal to pay and the legal avenue opened by the 2013 Supreme Court ruling, which allowed individuals summoned for non-payment to mount defensive challenges in court.
When SANRAL announced in March 2019 that it would cease issuing summonses for unpaid e-Toll debts, Duvenage described the move as a “deathblow” that signalled the government’s desire to avoid further voter backlash ahead of the 2019 elections. The cessation of summonses effectively removed the enforcement mechanism that had previously compelled a minority of drivers to settle their toll obligations, accelerating the erosion of the system’s financial viability and paving the way for its eventual shutdown five years later.
The final offline date of 11 April 2024 marked the formal termination of e-Toll billing, but the administrative process of winding down the programme involves more than just disabling the gantries. SANRAL must now reconcile outstanding debt accounts, decommission the central processing software, and reallocate the physical infrastructure for alternative uses or removal. Meanwhile, the government is tasked with identifying new financing streams to sustain the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project, a challenge that will shape future infrastructure funding models across the province.
