News

Over 4000 Nasinu ratepayers not paying dues

November 23, 2020 5:48 am

The Nasinu Town Council has revealed that over 4, 000 ratepayers have not been paying their dues for years.

Special Administrators Chair, Bhaskaran Nair says there are around 11,000 ratepayers in Nasinu.

Nair says the Council is owed just over $9m in unpaid rates.

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“We have put in place a number of measures that legally entitles us the council to take action against defaulting ratepayers. If less than $5000 so we would take them to Small claims tribunal and for those owing more than $5000 than we seek the assistance of the Magistrates court”.

He adds other steps are also being taken to collect outstanding dues.

“We are also doing house to house campaigns, we are going to the ratepayers work area as well so that we can talk to them while they are at work and this has helped. W is saying to them that if they can make arrangements to pay, we are happy to look at arrangements because some of them can’t afford to pay all at once”.

Local Government Minister Premila Kumar has stressed the need for councils to work together with ratepayers.

“If you talk to the ratepayers they will understand your financial situation and that’s what we need to do on a regular basis so that they understand us and assist us in running our councils better”.

The Nasinu Municipality has been ranked the worst in rate payments out of the 13 councils in the country.