The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) will account to, and provide a briefing for, Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Transport, regarding the challenges faced by the Shosholoza Meyl long-distance passenger service. So assured committee chairperson Mina Lesoma in a statement released on Tuesday. The hearings will take place early next year.

The committee would not comment on the challenges faced by PRASA until after it had heard from the agency’s officials, she affirmed.

“It is odd that some leaders will just dismiss challenges that they know that are there as a PR exercise and, without reason or cause, even blame it on incompetence of hard-working officials,” she stated. “PRASA has been invited to Parliament to both the Portfolio Committee on Transport and the Standing Committee on Public Accounts on more than four occasions this year.”

This past weekend, it was reported that the Shosholoza Meyl train from Johannesburg to Cape Town had had to stop in Wellington, some 72 km short of its destination. The passengers had to complete their journey on buses. This was apparently because of vandalised railway infrastructure.

This was one of the reasons that the Portfolio Committee on Transport had made PRASA “its most important” concern. That was also aligned with the State Capture Commission report’s observation that PRASA was an agency which had challenges.

“The people who criticise the efforts [of PRASA] will never ride a train in their lifetime,” asserted Lesoma. “Theirs is to follow train journeys on social media. Sadly, that is not how Parliament and government work gets done. We will follow the established accountability protocols and understand the extent of the challenge.”

The committee would give credit or criticism where it was merited.

“Work on the rails is continuing, as evidenced by moving the first batch of those living [informally] on the [Cape Town Central Line] rail tracks on the weekend,” she pointed out. “We note and are excited by this work of government and in the same vein call on PRASA to focus on the work in hand and effect the necessary interventions.”