R2 Billion for Joburg, Zero for Cape Town's Poor: A Shameful Betrayal of Local Dignity and Economic Justice
Image: Melinda Stuurman
"We live here, we clean here, we protect here why then must we watch outsiders get paid to do what our people are desperate to do for survival?"
When the City of Cape Town awarded a R2 billion tender — yes, two thousand million rand — to a Johannesburg-based company for cleaning and security services across our transport hubs, it didn't just overlook a few local businesses. It slammed the door shut on thousands of unemployed Capetonians, on hundreds of community-based enterprises, on our own city's dignity and economic sovereignty.
Let's call this what it is: A disgraceful betrayal.
A moral failure.
A neoliberal procurement racket dressed up as efficiency.
The Facts That Should Enrage Every Capetonian
The awarded tender reportedly spanning eight years goes to CBRE Excellerate Facilities, headquartered in Johannesburg, not Cape Town.
The value? R2 billion.
No mention has been made of how many jobs will go to Capetonians, if any. No commitments to local subcontracting. No transparency around local bids rejected.
The work? Cleaning, security, and maintenance at MyCiTi and other city transport hubs. Tasks our local cooperatives, NGOs, FBOs, CBOs, youth enterprises, and SMMEs are more than capable of performing.
We are not asking to clean skyscrapers in Sandton.
We are asking to clean and guard our own streets. And we're being denied.
Where is the Local Economic Development Agenda?
This is not just a missed opportunity. It is a policy sin against our poor.
Let's do the math:
If even R1 billion of this was ring-fenced for local small contractors, Cape Town could have: Created at least 5,000 sustainable local jobs.
Enabled 100+ small cleaning or security firms to build capacity, up-skill workers, and support families.
Built inclusive ecosystems around faith-based organisations (FBOs), civic bodies, cooperatives, and unemployed youth.
Instead, the City outsourced our livelihoods to a faraway corporate behemoth whose executives may not even know where Delft is, or what Khayelitsha needs.
Excuses Will Be Made. None Will Be Justified.
We've heard it all before:
"They scored highest on compliance."
"The tender was open and fair."
"Local firms didn't meet the requirements."
Well, who sets the requirements?
Who designs the procurement processes?
Who decides what 'capacity' mean?
Let's not pretend this isn't systemic gatekeeping. This is economic apartheid by spreadsheet. A democracy that denies economic participation is not a democracy at all.
Imagine a Cape Town That Trusted Its People
Imagine if that same R2 billion had been: Split across 24 wards, each given R83 million to form local cooperatives for maintenance and security.
Linked to skills training for young people.
Monitored by ward committees, CBOs, faith leaders, and local oversight forums.
Required 60% of all jobs to be drawn from within a 10km radius of each site.
This is not utopia. It is called community wealth building and it is being done in Barcelona, Cleveland, Manchester, and other progressive cities.
Why not here? Why not us?
What This Tender Reveals About the City's Priorities
This R2 billion scandal must be seen for what it is: Evidence of Cape Town's anti-poor bias.
A deep structural betrayal of local economic justice.
A deliberate sidelining of community capacity in favour of corporate control.
It is part of a broader pattern:
Gentrified housing projects that displace the poor.
Privatised public spaces.
Red-tape strangling informal traders.
And now, billion-rand contracts shipped out of town.
A Call to Action for All Capetonians
We must not let this pass quietly.We must raise our voices.
1. Demand transparency: What were the local bids received?
Why were Cape Town-based companies rejected?
Who scored the bids and with what criteria?
2. Demand justice: The City must ring-fence 60% of this contract for local subcontractors.
Civil society, unions, religious councils, and civic forums must unite to call for a full audit of this and all major outsourced contracts.
3. Demand a new procurement policy: Local first. Poor first. Community first.
Legislation and bylaws must be reformed to prioritise transformative local procurement not neoliberal compliance fetishism.
Final Word: Cape Town is Not for Sale
Capetonians built this city.
We clean it. We guard it. We carry its burdens.
Now we are told we are not good enough to serve it?
This is not just about one tender.
It is about a broken system that rewards the powerful and penalises the poor.
We must stand up. Speak out. Organise.
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