True world-class status depends not just on infrastructure, but on equitable access and resilience for all residents. Johannesburg’s water crisis exposes this gap, as affluent areas enjoy reliable supply while many townships face frequent outages.
- Johannesburg’s reputation as a “world-class African city” is under pressure as residents continue to face severe water shortages and broken infrastructure.
- In areas like Alexandra, dry taps, burst pipes, and overflowing sewage reveal deep failures in basic service delivery.
- The ongoing water crisis exposes how far the city still is from achieving the standards it claims where access to something as simple as water remains uncertain.
The smell hits first. Rotting refuse spills from torn plastic bags beside a cracked pavement in Alexandra, Johannesburg’s oldest township. Dirty bins overflow under the heat, attracting flies that circle lazily before landing on empty plastic bottles and wilting cabbage leaves. A group of boys sit nearby, passing around a joint and talking loudly.
Men stand on corners, bayashela (courting) whistling softly and calling out to passing girls with easy charm. “Eh, sisi, ungahambi kanjalo, uyangichaza!” (Eh sister when you walk like that, I get smitten) one shouts, and laughter spills across the road. Children chase each other through puddles formed by a burst pipe, their feet slapping against the mud and tar. They play freely, unaware that the water soaking their shoes is both a luxury and a warning.
As we walk deeper into the area, my classmate Nomfundo and I hold hands, not out of affection, but instinct. The atmosphere does not scream free or safe. Every corner feels like it is watching you. The streets buzz with music from taxis, the smell of fried chips and oil thick in the air. After circling the area, we buy a kota from a spaza near the corner: polony, cheese, atchar, and a slice of russian squeezed into white bread. We sit on an upturned crate, eating quietly, just taking it all in. Around us, life continues children play, someone fixes a tire, another washes cars with buckets of stored water.
This is not the Johannesburg of brochures and billboards. This is the other side of the city – the one that exposes how the rhetoric of world-class collapses under the weight of broken pipes, empty taps, and forgotten promises.
A city divided by class
The City of Johannesburg brands itself as a “World-Class African City,” a phrase meant to signal progress, innovation, and global competitiveness. But what does that mean in a city where water, the most basic human right, cannot be guaranteed?
To call Johannesburg world-class suggests it meets the standards of sustainable urban governance, equitable service delivery, and modern infrastructure. Yet, the ongoing water crisis reveals a more complicated truth. In practice, the city’s ambitions are deeply disconnected from the lived realities of millions who call its informal settlements and townships home. The contrast between vision and reality makes Johannesburg not a world-class African city, but a divided one.
“Water is an essential urban service in any context,” says Mike Muller, Adjunct Professor of Water, Governance, and Climate Change at Wits University. He explains that Johannesburg’s regional water schemes particularly the Integrated Vaal River System are technically advanced and, in theory, sufficient.
“If water use is properly managed and infrastructure built when scheduled, water availability should not be a constraint,” he says. The issue, therefore, is not scarcity but management. Muller warns that the municipal governance of water in Johannesburg “shares many of the weaknesses of other unequal, middle-income countries.” In other words: the pipes are world-class, but the politics are not.
When planning fails
According to water and sanitation utility Johannesburg Water, the city’s supply chain depends on a multi-layered system. The Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) allocates water from the Vaal Dam to bulk water utility company Rand Water, which purifies it before selling it to Johannesburg Water the municipal entity responsible for distribution.
But cracks have long been appearing in this system. A combination of aging infrastructure, delayed projects, and population growth has placed unbearable pressure on supply. Gauteng’s population grew from 12 million in 2010 to over 15 million in 2023, yet the region’s water infrastructure hasn’t kept pace.
The Lesotho Highlands Water Project, designed to increase Johannesburg’s water capacity, has been delayed until 2028 precisely during a period when demand has surged. That delay, as experts warn, has “cost the city its water sovereignty.”
Flowing from the wealth of Sandton into the overcrowded streets of Alexandra, the Jukskei river, [Ed1] [LK2] which flows north to the Crocodile River eventually reaching the Hartbeespoort Dam, is a constant carrier of waste, choked with sewage, plastics, and chemical run-off. For years, residents have lived with the stench and the danger, while city officials promise solutions that rarely last. Clean-up drives by community groups like the Alexandra Water Warriors and initiatives such as SUNCAS “Turning Trash into Treasures” project show courage and commitment, but they are temporary fixes in a system built on inequality.
Each time there’s an attempt at cleaning the river, it fills with waste again a reminder that the problem is deeper than pollution, it’s about neglect, broken infrastructure, and the uneven delivery of public services. If Johannesburg is to be a truly world-class African city, its greatness must flow through every street, every tap, and every river not just the ones near its wealthy centres.
The Lesotho Highlands Water Project, designed to increase Johannesburg’s water capacity, has been delayed until 2028 precisely during a period when demand has surged. That delay, as experts warn, has “cost the city its water sovereignty.”
Flowing from the wealth of Sandton into the overcrowded streets of Alexandra, the Jukskei river is no longer a source of life, but a carrier of waste choked with sewage, plastics, and chemical run-off. For years, residents have lived with the stench and the danger, while city officials promise solutions that rarely last. Clean-up drives by community groups like the Alexandra Water Warriors and initiatives such as SUNCAS Turning Trash into Treasures” project show courage and commitment, but they are temporary fixes in a system built on inequality.
Each time the river is cleared, it fills with waste again a reminder that the problem is deeper than pollution, it’s about neglect, broken infrastructure, and the uneven delivery of public services. If Johannesburg is to be a truly world-class African city, its greatness must flow through every street, every tap, and every river not just the ones near its wealthy centres.
A “scarily predictable” boiling point
By September 2025, Johannesburg’s water crisis reached what the Daily Maverick called a “scarily predictable” breaking point. Protests erupted across Alexandra, Soweto, and parts of the West Rand. Tyres burned, and police fired rubber bullets as residents demanded answers and water.
The South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA) observed that the crisis reveals the state’s failure to deliver on socio-economic rights enshrined in the Constitution. Chapter 2 of the South African Constitution guarantees that “everyone has the right to have access to sufficient food and water.” Yet, in practice, this right depends on where you live.
The residents’ reality
For small business owners like Fanas Monaise, who runs a car wash in Alexandra, water scarcity is not just an inconvenience, it’s economic ruin. “Yoh, my sister, I started this business last year,” he says, wiping sweat from his forehead. “When there is no water, I cannot wash cars, I can’t earn. Sometimes I lose so much I can’t even buy food, never mind take my girl out.”
Nearby, Thabo Maseko, a frustrated resident, points toward a municipal water truck. “We wait for that thing like it’s a miracle, neh?” he says. “They say we must pay for water, but what are we paying for? In Sandton, they never close the taps[Ed1] . Here, they treat us like we don’t count.”
In recent months, even areas like Sandton and its surrounding suburbs have faced water outages and supply cuts, though never as prolonged or severe as those in Alexandra. Yet the moment the shortages began affecting affluent neighbourhoods, public concern and political urgency suddenly intensified. For many residents in Alex, this contrast is a painful reminder that Johannesburg’s response to crisis still depends on who is suffering, and where.
When a camera appears, veyes follow it closely. “Eish, how much is that camera, sisi?” Thabo shouts, half-joking, half-threatening. Another adds, “Haai, wena, careful these phara’s (thieves) will steal it fast- fast!” The tone is mixed curiosity laced with warning, the street talk of survival. For many in Alex, visibility means vulnerability as their stories are captured, but their suffering ignored.
Governance and the politics of water
According to Sipho Mthembu, former board chair of Johannesburg Water, three key issues plague the system: infrastructure decay, non-revenue water, and illegal connections.
“People don’t want to pay for water,” he admits, “but the city also shuts off water when they can’t pay. It’s a vicious cycle.” The city loses up to 40% of its water to leaks and theft, losses that could otherwise serve entire communities.
According to Sipho Mthembu, former board chair of Johannesburg Water, three key issues plague the system: infrastructure decay, non-revenue water, and illegal connections.
“People don’t want to pay for water,” he admits, “but the city also shuts off water when they can’t pay. It’s a vicious cycle.” The city loses up to 40% of its water to leaks and theft, losses that could otherwise serve entire communities.
This is not merely a technical problem, it is political. Years of underinvestment, corruption, and bureaucratic mismanagement have hollowed out municipal institutions. Each administration blames the last, but residents continue to suffer. According to Business Tech, the management of Johannesburg’s water crisis has come under scrutiny, particularly about the city’s ability to restore supply promptly. Reports show that earlier promises to resolve outages quickly were not met, and delays in maintenance, partly linked to R4-billion being removed from Joburg Water’s budget, have contributed to the problem
As Prof. Ian Jandrell, Wits Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Systems and Operations, notes, “It’s fair to say we are facing a crisis in terms of water and service delivery in general. Without a doubt, this is a serious situation.”
The crisis, Jandrell argues, reveals a fundamental flaw in Johannesburg’s governance mode, it aspires to be globally competitive before ensuring basic local functionality.
Bridging Academia and Action
Projects like Wits Water (recently relaunched as Wits:H20), led by Professor Craig Sheridan, attempt to address this. “We want to think as a society about the water challenges we face,” he says. “How do we keep water in our pipes? How do we ensure there’s water not just in Joburg but in Gauteng as a whole”.
“South Africa is currently grappling with a substantial skills shortage in the water sector,” says Sheridan. “Years of limited investment in training and capacity development have resulted in too few qualified engineers, hydrologists, water managers, and sanitation specialists. Wits: H₂O seeks not only to advance research but also to rebuild this critical skills base, while training and mentoring the next generation of professionals who will tackle the growing water challenges facing our country and continent.”
Andrew Hope-Jones, CEO of Wits Enterprise, adds: “By connecting Johannesburg Water with the university’s research expertise, we ensure that innovation developed in the lab can be translated into practical solutions.” These collaborations aim to transform research into action to “bring water, dignity, and development to the people of Johannesburg.” Yet, the gap between promise and practice remains wide. While academia theorizes sustainability, residents rely on buckets and tankers.
Johannesburg’s crisis is further compounded by climate variability. Changing rainfall patterns and longer dry spells mean that even advanced systems face strain. But, as Muller insists, if infrastructure is built on time and water use managed properly, climate change alone would not cripple the system.
That Johannesburg still struggles shows a deeper structural inequality. Climate impacts don’t create injustice they expose it. The same storms that fill suburban swimming pools flood township shacks.
The Mirage in the Tap
On paper, the city boasts sophisticated regional water systems and ambitious development plans. Yet, across townships and informal settlements, access to water remains inconsistent and unreliable. This gap raises a critical question: can a city truly be considered world-class when its basic services are not universally secured?
Water flows reliably in affluent areas, yet many residents in disadvantaged neighborhoods face frequent outages and limited access. This disparity demonstrates that true world-class status depends on both infrastructure and equitable, resilient service for all.
Earlier in the day, the water truck had arrived in Alexandra. Residents hurried out with buckets and bottles, calling to one another as they tried to collect what they could before the tank ran dry. For a short while, there is r[PS1] elief and laughter, movement, the sound of water hitting the bucket. But by dusk, the truck was gone, and the taps were still empty. The wait has begun again. In the fading light, Sandton’s skyline glows in the distance a shimmering mirage of wealth and modernity. Yet that glow means nothing to those who sleep beside dry taps and overflowing bins.
FEATURE ARTICLE: Protesters outside Johannesburg Council Chambers, photo by:Lindelwa Khanyile
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