Johannesburg, once a world class African city. What went wrong?

Johannesburg, the once proud City of Gold, has become tarnished by crumbling infrastructure, a breakdown in service delivery, and poor administration. 

Founded in 1886 as a mining town following the discovery of gold at the Witwatersrand reef, the city soon emerged, with townships housing the labour reserve.

Once a beacon of hope, an escape from poverty, a place where residents didn't want for anything, decades and decades later, residents wish for the most basic of services such as adequate water and sanitation, electricity, housing and the high crime rate as the unemployment rate soars like an Eagle into the sky.

Now, one is greeted by the stench of sewers running down the streets as they walk or drive into the CBD — what an undesired welcome.

After years and years of service delivery protests, without any meaningful response from the government, one would say Joburg residents are swimming against the stream. 

A city plagued by rot, both in the literal and figurative sense.

One does not beam with pride when thinking of taking pictures next to buildings and monuments that the older generations took pride in, like the Ponte skyscraper and many others, as these buildings are visibly decaying, deteriorating structures with worn paint, broken doors, and windows. It is an unpleasant sight.

There's a phrase about caring for and maintaining stuff.

"The essence of keeping things lies in the management."

The management and the keepers of Jozi did not do due diligence.

Political analyst Goodenough Mashego said: " I think Johannesburg arrived where it is because of mismanagement, the lack of political will to fix it and because the people who have been running it have had this vision that they can leave."

According to Mashego, the leadership, over the years, has had an attitude that this is not their personal belonging, and they are going to hand it over, so they didn't dedicate themselves.

"Some of the people who ran the city, have now relocated the the likes of Bantry Bay, Cape Town, and Roodepoort, because they saw the city as a place where they could make money if there was money to be made, however the Johannesburg which was founded on gold, the executives of that gold lived in Johannesburg, that's how it became such a city."

Independent political commentator Professor Pieter Duvenage said the collapse of Johannesburg is a sad example of urban decline.

"Johannesburg’s decline has become one of South Africa’s most tragic urban stories, the slow collapse of a city that once symbolised hope and ambition," he said.

"Built on the energy of gold and shaped by migration, Johannesburg was imagined as Africa’s modern metropolis: vibrant, prosperous, and full of promise. Today, that vision lies in disrepair."

Duvenage said the city needs a leadership with a renewed purpose where things are done on merit and not out of favour.

"Failing water and sanitation systems, crumbling buildings, and unreliable services tell a story of institutional decay. Maintenance budgets have been misused or ignored, while corruption and cadre deployment have stripped the city of technical skill," he said.

"Around 40% of Johannesburg’s water is lost through leaks before it even reaches residents, and raw sewage routinely spills into rivers. The skyline, once a mark of modernity, is now filled with abandoned high-rises turned into unsafe informal dwellings — visible symbols of urban neglect and state failure," Duvenage said.

"At the heart of the crisis lies a breakdown in governance and accountability. Fragile political coalitions have crippled long-term planning. Departments work in isolation, procurement favours loyalty over competence, and service delivery has been sacrificed to factional power struggles."

However, Duvenage said that not all is lost in Johannesburg; there is an opportunity for rejuvenation. 

"A turnaround is still possible, but only through decisive leadership and professional management. Johannesburg needs a capable political coalition supported by an independent technocratic team to rebuild basic infrastructure, enforce building safety and restore financial discipline. Partnerships with business and communities can help stabilise essential services and rebuild trust."

Duvenage said civic responsibility was needed for the city to reclaim its status.

"Ultimately, fixing Johannesburg is not just about pipes and pavements. It’s about purpose and integrity. The city’s revival depends on more than technical repair; it requires moral renewal and civic responsibility. Only then can the 'city of gold' reclaim its place as a city of dignity."

In a written response, City of Johannesburg spokesperson Nthatisi Modingoane acknowledged the city's decay and indicated that there are plans over a decade old to improve the city, whose effects are yet to be seen and felt.

"The city has always been cognisant of its ageing infrastructure, capacity constraints and backlogs, and launched a more than R110 billion spend on the provision of infrastructure over ten years. Over three years, more than R30 billion was allocated to the replacement and upgrading of ageing infrastructure as well as new infrastructure," Modingoane said.

"In the 2013/14 financial year alone, R7.3 billion was allocated for infrastructure, which represents almost double that from the R4.6 billion in 2012/13. The 2014/15 financial year allocated a further doubling of R13.5 billion. However, with the political changes in 2016, this programme was halted," he said.

"Since coming into office, the Government of Local Unity has been hard at work to stabilise the City’s finances, fix our roads, traffic lights, build Reservoirs, pipe replacements, microgrids in informal settlements, as well as undertake routine maintenance of the city’s infrastructure."

Modingoane said that the city was tackling its problems head-on with rejuvenation programmes in place.

"On July 31, 2024, the City of Johannesburg City Council approved the comprehensive turnaround strategies for City Power and Johannesburg Water, marking a significant milestone in bolstering essential municipal services across the city," he said.

"Both the City Power and Johannesburg Water Turnaround Strategies have been approved by Council and were submitted to the National Treasury in compliance with regulatory requirements. This represents a concerted effort by the City of Johannesburg to strengthen municipal operations, improve service delivery, and ensure sustainable infrastructure for future generations."

Gauteng Provincial Government spokesperson, Elijah Mhlanga, said the City of Johannesburg is in an undesirable position owing to factors of mismanagement.

"People often attribute Johannesburg's decline solely to corruption and mismanagement. While these are significant factors, they are not the only problems. The city's crisis is far bigger and more complicated; corruption is merely one symptom of a larger, failing system," Mhlanga said.

"Firstly, the province's economic geography is shifting. The trend of "urban sprawl," marked by the development of new commercial nodes like the expanding Sandton, Waterfall City, Steyn City, and Lanseria, represents a fragmentation of the city rather than simple growth," he said.

"Secondly, a continuously growing population is placing a huge strain on essential services like water, electricity, and housing. Finally, the city is hampered by a fundamentally broken municipal funding model."

According to Mhlanga, the relocation of affluent figures has also contributed to the Johannesburg crisis.

"This decentralisation leads to companies and affluent residents migrating, and they take with them the crucial rates and taxes that fund city-wide services. This creates a vicious cycle: service delivery in the inner-city declines, prompting further exodus, and further draining municipal coffers," Mhlanga said.

"The problem is no longer just internal mismanagement, but a competitive landscape where Johannesburg is losing its primary revenue generators," he said.

"This is a global phenomenon and cities like Nairobi, Kenya; Mumbai, India; Mexico City, Mexico; and Johannesburg, South Africa, share several commonalities. They are dominant economic, political, and cultural centres, which creates a powerful "pull" factor," said Mhlanga.

"However, the rapid influx of people leads to several problems: the inability to provide formal housing at a necessary pace result in the growth of slums or informal settlements; transport, water, sanitation, and electricity systems become chronically overburdened; and the social gap widens between a wealthy elite and a large, struggling working class."

As it stands, according to Hibitat for Humanity, South Africa has a housing backlog of housing 2.6 million units. Speaking to Newzroom Afrika in February, Johannesburg MMC of Human Settlements, Mlungisi Mabaso said the city has a housing backlog of 400,000 RDP units.

"Recent data confirms significant in-migration into Gauteng, with projections of about 1.42 million migrants between 2021 and 2026, driven by economic opportunities and a better quality of life. One report from Stats SA mentions over 3.5 million internal migrants over a decade, which means Johannesburg, as the main city, will receive a huge chunk of these arrivals," said Mhlanga.

Alluding to the lack of political and social foresight, Mhlanga said: "The city’s infrastructure, from water and sanitation to housing and electricity, was not designed for such rapid, sustained population growth. 

"The result is an immense strain on resources, leading to overburdened clinics, overcrowded informal settlements, and collapsing sewer systems. The city administration, already hamstrung by capacity issues, is perpetually playing catch-up, unable to plan effectively for a population that expands faster than its budget."

Mhlanga said the growing population is outpacing the budget, leading to the most intractable part of the crisis: the funding model.

"The current system, reliant on a shrinking base of ratepayers to subsidise services for a vast and growing number of residents who cannot or do not pay, is mathematically unsustainable," Mhlanga said.

"The city is caught in an impossible position. Its constitutional mandate to provide basic services like water and electricity to all collides with the reality that a significant portion of its consumer base is indigent or relies on an informal economy. Non-payment, whether due to poverty, protest, or a collapse in billing confidence, strangles the revenue stream needed to maintain the very infrastructure delivering those services," he said.

"This creates a service delivery death spiral, where deteriorating quality justifies non-payment, which in turn guarantees further deterioration."

Mhlanga asserted that concerted efforts are underway to revitalise Johannesburg.

However, Joburg residents said that they have stopped relying on the government for service delivery.

At the back of the comments from both the city of the provincial government, IOL took to the streets of Johannesburg to solicit views from the people on the ground.

Jacob Mshezi, 31, who stays in a flat in the Johannesburg CBD said: "Vuk'uzenzele (wake up and do it yourself), relying on the government has proved not to be a viable approach, you'll die waiting for the government to help you, just look at how long it took to fix Bree Street after the explosion. Right now we don't have water in our flat, that is why you see these people passing here with buckets and bottles, they are going to get water from a truck somewhere around the corner or on the next street.

Mbongeni Mkhize, a 63-year-old taxi driver, said: "I've been in the city for years, and as a person whose work is on the road, it doesn't sit well with me to be ducking so many potholes, ducking the same potholes for years. I don't know what the current leaders are doing, but it is not good."

The Star