Joburg’s R83bn budget dissected

Johannesburg MMC of finance Dada Morero yesterday unveiled a R83.1 billion budget – centered around bulk infrastructure, inclusive growth, and the delivery of services – an increase from last year’s R80.9 billion.

He said the budget allocations reflected efforts to build a resilient city that was financially sustainable and put its residents at the centre of development. Morero admitted bulk infrastructure across Joburg has come under pressure for several reasons, including ageing infrastructure that cannot cope with demand, and budgetary constraints.

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“The 2024-25 IDP [Integrated Development Planning] Review and its budget acknowledges the decaying infrastructure, which during the apartheid regime was only built to service minority communities,” he said.

“This budget tries to break this cycle of infrastructure oppression and segregation.”

The city’s current financial crisis left much to be desired and affected its ability to render basic services to residents.

The city has been marred by lack of basic service delivery and maintenance infrastructure, violent crime, water and power supply, and revenue collection shortfalls, among other troubles.

Key in the MMC’s address was the upgrading and renewal of Johannesburg Water networks.

Morero allocated R18.3 billion to support its programmes, including Water Demand Management systems and prevention of infrastructure theft and vandalism and an additional R4.5 billion capital budget.

He said the allocation was aimed at carrying forward projects that investigate the maintenance and upgrade of existing water bulk infrastructure.

“The focus is mainly on the upgrading and renewal of networks, expansion of Wastewater Treatment Works, reservoir storage capacity and water demand management initiatives,” he said.

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“In the next five years, 77.8 kilometres of water networks and 73.6 kilometres of sewer networks is planned to be replaced. In 2024-25, Johannesburg Water will continue to roll out the reservoir storage upgrades.”

Senior economist Pieter Scribante and ActionSA’s Team Fix SA member for economic development said the budget prioritised keeping the status quo while not resolving any of the issues.

“There’s a clear deviation from thinking in the long term versus short term, and they’re prioritising the short term,” he said.

“As we’ve seen, this has been happening as well, with a lot of some of the promises made on labour issues and service delivery have not come to fruition.”

Morero said the city would also focus on crime prevention, bylaw enforcement and road-traffic management with a budget allocation of R6.1 billion.

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Meanwhile, the human settlements department has been allocated an operational expenditure budget of R1.2 billion, and a multi-year capital budget of R3.4 billion over the medium term will allow the department to deliver over 2 000 housing opportunities.

However, the budget also outlined tariff hikes for the new financial year amid economic strain.

According to Morero, hikes will include electricity – up by 12.7%; water – up by 7.7%; and rates – up 3.8%.

Scribante said while the city needed more money, it also needed to consider the reality of the people on the ground. “The main problem is, it’s not always about more money,” he said.