Budget chaos, unsustainable debt plans, and critical funding cuts threatening Joburg's water and sanitation infrastructure indicate financial and administrative chaos in the City.

On 27 February, the City of Joburg council tabled an adjustment budget with a little more spending for water infrastructure, following WaterCAN and JoburgCAN’s petition demanding a major budget rewrite. However, the council failed to process it when the meeting collapsed due to political infighting and disruption by the ANC. 

Our petition called for ringfencing water revenue to ensure a R3 billion capital spending budget for Joburg Water, which would go a long way toward solving Joburg’s persistent water woes. 

WaterCAN and JoburgCAN highlighted the following points of concern in the adjustment budget:

Slight increase in water infrastructure funding: Despite public pressure and our petition, the City only allocated a slight increase of R70 million to the Joburg Water capital budget, which is insufficient to address critical water infrastructure needs.

Debt funding: The City plans to take on an additional R8.2 billion in debt over the next three years, which is unsustainable given the City’s financial struggles.

Shifting funds from sanitation to water: The budget cuts R30 million from the Bushkoppies wastewater treatment works (WWTW) and R1.5 million from Goudkoppies WWTW projects, both of which have severe pollution issues. This reallocation is unacceptable.

Overall, WaterCAN and JoburgCAN express concern about the City’s financial management, prioritising debt funding over essential services, and failing to adequately address infrastructure needs, especially in water and sanitation.

We noted previously (see here) that, in the 2024/25 main budget, the City Manager’s office costs R1.9 billion a year in operational costs (more than Health at R1.5 billion), Group Finance costs R6 billion (more than Public Safety), Group Information and Communication Technology costs R1 billion, and “Municipal Entities Accounts” costs R2 billion (this is in addition to separate budgets for City Power, Joburg Water, Pikitup, Joburg Roads Agency and nine other entities). We believe there are opportunities for reprioritisation.

The collapsed council meeting could result in the City missing the legal deadline and requiring National Treasury permission to approve a late budget.

Read more about the work done by WaterCAN here.