06-05-2025
Wanted: A new government for Johannesburg's great people
Johannesburg is increasingly governed by WhatsApp groups, and its citizens are so active that they demand accountability in remarkably resilient and sometimes obstinate ways.
There's no hustle like Joburg hustle. We may not have regular electricity, water, a functioning road network, or even streetlights, but that doesn't stop the city from growing.
There's always something new starting up or somewhere new to go, so you can fill a social calendar several times. Each day.
And the people! Don't even get me started on the level of style in this city, where each country on our continent has a community. It's just lovely. (See this piece on Braamfontein's plans, or this humdinger on five must-sees in the city by Bridget Hilton-Barber for flavour.)
But is it 'a world-class African city' as the city government continues to call itself? Not so much.
To make it all it can be, this city of great people needs a different way of being governed. There's money. With a budget of R83-billion a year, we should expect more. It's bigger than the national budgets of many African nations and certainly among the spending pies of much larger cities like Lagos and Cairo.
In his State of the City Address, Mayor Dada Morero will paint a picture of how much he's doing. Last year, the then mayor, Kabelo Gwamanda, (remember him?) promised many things. Every year since 2021, the State of the City Address has been delivered by a different mayor as coalition government political instability rocks Joburg.
The report card shows some progress, but this is because of the city's people rather than its government. Civil society has organised itself so well into organisations such as the Johannesburg Water Crisis Action Group and WaterCAN that improvements in water provision have been made as people have insisted on them.
'We're far away from where we used to be [in crisis],' says Dr Ferrial Adam of WaterCAN. There are improvements, but not enough is being spent on fixing 20 of the city's broken reservoirs, says Adam, who is also concerned that a good water turnaround strategy for Johannesburg Water is not included in the city's Integrated Development Plan, which is the budget blueprint. 'There is (as yet) no major system improvement,' she says.
The Jozi My Jozi movement mushroomed out of the business community, and its CEO, Bea Swanepoel, has created a small and dynamic team of can-do people who have done a great deal.
They've fixed and lit up the Nelson Mandela Bridge that joins suburbs to the inner city, ramped up and cleaned entry points and exits to the city, and are working with the government on an ambitious plan to make the inner city a truly world-class African old town.
The safety improvements stem from a partnership with the CCTV supplier Vumacam.
The city is increasingly governed by WhatsApp groups, and its citizens are so active that they demand accountability in remarkably resilient and sometimes obstinate ways.
Urbicide
There is momentum now to write only the story of seeding improvement, but to do so would be to ignore the urbicide that successive administrations have visited during their stewardship.
These charts from the Gauteng City-Region Observatory's quality-of-life survey, released last year, show that services across Gauteng have declined precipitously.
This is why the ANC lost power in its heartland province, earning support from only 34% of voters. The province and city also show that coalitions (in place since 2021) are no panacea and that what is needed is a method of co-governance with its people to make Johannesburg all it can be.
An upcoming Daily Maverick data investigation in the city will show how its people are now plagued by endemic, multiday electricity cuts.
Power cuts led to a decline in ANC power
Mayor Morero delivers his speech in the beautiful Constance Bapela Chamber — the Metro Centre, to which it is attached, was abandoned by the city almost two years ago.
In a sleight-of-hand by the Johannesburg Property Company, and after two fires not adequately explained to its people, thousands of staff left the building one day in 2023 and never returned.
This is what it looks like now: plans abandoned, expensive furniture with nobody to use it, an entire beautiful library, dark and locked. Homeless people have started occupying the lower floors. The information centre adjacent to the building was gutted by fire long ago and never secured or repaired.
Urbicide is the killing of a city, and when I visited the abandoned Metro Centre, it felt like an apt description. (Backstory: the Metro Centre was 'decanted' of its people after the fire, pending a massive plan to rebuild a campus, probably by ANC cadres in property. It will take nine years and 11 months to build, during which time the same cadres will earn a fortune in rentals because they also own the buildings where the mayor and other officials now work. Here's that story.)
A city must have a Metro Centre, where its citizens get plans approved, get bills sorted out, access city services, chat to councillors, and attend residents' meetings. It's a spinal column, and without it, you kill a city. The Metro Centre tells you all you need to know about city government in Johannesburg.
Killing a night economy
There's another death to mourn. The Marabi Club, a magnificent 'speakeasy', closes this weekend. It's where I got engaged, and I have many happy memories of the place. This gorgeous jazz venue on the eastern flank of the inner city can't sustain itself. There are virtually no working streetlights in Joburg, and the potholes and regular power and water cuts have seen 40 cultural venues in the inner city shut up shop.
The city's night economy has always been a lifeblood of its culture. Marabi perfectly expressed it: the food, the jazz, the people, the venue — stylish with a Sophiatown vibe.
'If you aren't familiar, Marabi is an underground speakeasy, attached to Hallmark House (a beautiful hotel) and inspired by survivalist Marabi culture – a music-driven spirit as old as Johannesburg itself,' writes Laurice Taitz-Buntman, the urbanist and publisher of Johannesburg in your Pocket.
Marabi is closing because some nights it runs at only 20% occupancy.
Taitz-Buntman writes: 'Johannesburg's decline is not a natural disaster – it is man-made. Entrepreneurs invested passion and capital into revitalising districts like Maboneng and Braamfontein, but the official city government and tourism bodies have mostly remained absent, leaving basic services to fall apart.
'Johannesburg is a city of two narratives: One of intense decline, destruction, dysfunction, and survival in a place where governance has all but disappeared. And another of vibrant creativity, deep human connection, and resilience.'
Her message is that we have to support our cultural businesses and nightlife, and support the throbbing vein of zeal and entrepreneurship that defines Johannesburg. We can't do that without a working government.
President Ramaphosa sends in a team
Two months ago, on 7 March, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced an intervention to arrest Johannesburg's decline. The G20 comes to town in November, and Joburg is a wreck. It's not a good look for the urbane President.
Convened under Operation Vulindlela (OV) in the Presidency, it is an informal intervention rather than a Section 139 takeover of a collapsed municipality made in terms of the Constitution.
There have been some changes in two months: the inner city is cleaner, as it's the region where the experiment started. It's come too late for Marabi and the other wonderful places that have closed. However, hope is an essential quality of being human, so I trust it will work.
The plan is to stabilise city finances, ensure reliable water and electricity supply, restore human settlement planning (there are hundreds of informal settlements around Johannesburg, and homeless people are abandoned), and address the decay of cultural institutions like the Johannesburg Art Gallery and the Johannesburg Library, which recently partially reopened after an inexplicable four-year, R64-million closure.
Whenever I chat with people from civil society and the metro government, they are hard at work in four clusters and eight workstreams, which is how Vulindlela operates to get things going.
The well-regarded OV team in the Presidency is behind major fixes like Eskom and (possibly) at Transnet. All three levels of government work together to intervene. Morero was due to send his first progress report to Ramaphosa on 5 May — officials say the impact will be more visceral come June.
