Political changes taking place in the City of Joburg as mayor Kabelo Gwamanda submitted his resignation today

NIGHT TALK

Guest: Tessa Dooms, Political analyst

Political changes taking place in the City of Joburg as mayor Kabelo Gwamanda submitted his resignation today. Used to be called ‘the world class African City’, Gwamanda was the ninth mayor of the city since the 2016 local government election—and the fifth since 2021.

• Political instability
• World Class African City?
• Gwamanda’s tenure
• Parties like EFF & PA under Gwamanda’s leadership - the performance.
• Infrastructure
• The role of COJ as an economic powerhouse
• Dada Morero urgent tasks
• 2026 elections

Joburg is crumbling – and the hole is R221 billion deep

Johannesburg, billed as Africa’s richest city because of its concentration of businesses and millionaires, needs R221 billion to catch up on maintenance and overdue upgrades across its collapsing road, power and water networks.

The city council discussed the shortfall late last month and detailed it in documents seen by Bloomberg.

It comes at a time when regular power outages — the result of distribution network breakdowns — hit large swathes of Johannesburg.

Officials left potholes unattended for months, and parts of the city had no water for as long as 11 days in March.

The work pileup “highlights significant risks to public safety, economic safety and the environment if not addressed,” the city said of the road network in the documents.

“Ignoring the backlog could lead to deteriorating roads, unsafe bridges, flooding and increased accidents.”

Financial and political turmoil in recent years have beset the city of about 5 million people, which has had eight mayors since 2019 due to constantly shifting coalitions.

While the African National Congress and Economic Freedom Fighters are the largest parties in the ruling coalition, with 119 seats between them, they have installed a mayor from the Al-Jama-ah party, which has just three seats. There are 270 councillors in total.