ANGELA RIVERS: Where to with a broken city?

The Johannesburg Property Owners & Managers Association was started in 2003 to provide a collective voice to the many people who offer affordable housing in the inner city of Johannesburg, in the hope that standing together would have a greater effect than individual voices.

Nearly 20 years later we are still here, still love our city and still care for our tenants, despite the many uphill battles. We provide affordable housing to thousands of people who live and work in the inner city and cannot rely on our “world-class African city” to offer the social housing that is standard in any other large metropole. 

It is difficult to remain positive when faced with the infighting and jostling for power characterising the city’s administration instead of proper service delivery. The rampant maladministration of the city’s resources affects every ratepayer, tenant, landlord and property owner.

The crisis around the improper billing for municipal services has been steadily growing for the past 12 years, and we are approaching a point of total breakdown. All efforts from ratepayers or their representatives to fix incorrect bills, of which there are literally thousands, are met with an ostrich-like head-in-the-sand approach, and a complete unwillingness on the part of the city to follow the logical path for any dispute of this nature.

The service level standard on the City of Johannesburg's website says 95% of billing queries should be resolved within 60 working days, and 100% within 90 days. The utter failure of this admirable intent is in equal parts infuriating and depressing.

Let’s spell it out. Johannesburg consistently fails to deliver the refuse removal, sewerage, water and electricity services it is legally required to do, and seems to operate with a policy of zero accountability. When challenged it stonewalls all appeals that do not come via a legal route, running up legal bills that amount to millions. Unlike those who have no choice but to engage legal firms to have their municipal accounts rectified, the city pays these bills with other people’s money — the very taxpayers whose rights are infringed end up footing the bill, adding insult to injury. Moreover, it also creates unnecessary backlogs in the courts, preventing matters that actually belong in court from being heard in good time.

The example of one of our members illustrates the magnitude of what is going on in our city. The member in question wants to remain anonymous due to fears of victimisation, which in itself is an indictment of Johannesburg’s public service policy. “Mr X” represents 40 buildings and about 8,200 households in the city. Presently he has 16 legal matters pending over incorrect billing totalling R45m, and he has already obtained 13 orders in respect of incorrect billing totalling R95m. Ten of these orders were obtained in 2022 alone.

He has also won about 2,000 cases of rates categorisation and tariff errors, where the city perpetually bills residential sectional title at the business category tariff, and where the Valuation Appeal Board found in his favour. A further 1,100 or so matters are in the process of being submitted, all of which Mr X is confident the board will also find in his favour, given that the circumstances are identical to earlier ones where that was the outcome.

Most matters pertain to billing errors associated with electricity, water and sewerage charges for various reasons — senseless estimated meter readings, incorrect meters reflected on accounts, incorrect tariff charges such as business instead of residential, and so on and on. Matters can take anywhere between six months and three years to finalise — even in cases where there is a court order the city sometimes simply refuses to comply.

An example: in February 2020 Mr X obtained an order that required the city to correct an account, which included an interdict to stop it terminating services to the building. This step was necessary since the City of Johannesburg had unlawfully terminated services on multiple earlier occasions, resulting in tenant unrest.

The city had 20 days within which to correct the account, which it failed to do. When a contempt of court application followed, it pleaded with Mr X to cease such action, promising that it would rectify matters. As of today, it has still not been done and he is now proceeding with the contempt application, which will seek personal cost orders against the city manager, mayor, MD of City Power, the MMC for finance, and the head of revenue.

We have to agree with Mr X that until those responsible for managing the City of Johannesburg are held accountable the situation of bad business practices coupled with pure neglect will never improve. Wasteful expenditure, which is damaging individuals and businesses alike, cannot be left unchallenged any longer.

The city has a R70bn budget for the 2022/2023 financial year. There is so much that can be done with that, and so much that is needed. There is such goodwill among ordinary citizens — those responsible ratepayers who pay their taxes and their municipal accounts to keep the lights on and the streets safe.

As an organisation we remain committed to playing our role in helping to solve these persistent problems, and extend a hand of collaboration to any and all administrators who share our commitment. The greater objective is straightforward — we want to help create the city the 6-million inhabitants of Johannesburg deserve.

• Rivers is GM of the Johannesburg Property Owners & Managers Association.