Why Ekurhuleni feels less broken than Joburg

You had better be sitting down. For most Gautengers, service delivery is an impossible dream. Getting what ratepayers pay for is too often a bridge too far for local government.

There are memes, complaints, hands-in-the-air emojis and gatvol ward councillors who have become de facto call centres. It is a mess.

It is also a tale of two cities pressed up against each other. Both have problems. Both have challenges. Yet the metros are very different. Who would have thought we would compare barely functional cities not by achievement, but by lesser evil.

Johannesburg is dead. Some residents call it a world-class African “shitty”. It is easy to see why. Drive through Yeoville. Head down Louis Botha Avenue. Check Sandton, Northcliff, the deep South and everywhere in between. It is overgrown.

Traffic lights are staffed by homeless people. Potholes have birthdays. Half completed works sit waiting for better days.

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This is why next year’s municipal elections matter. More than ever.

Cross the invisible border into Ekurhuleni and something feels different. The potholes, while still legion, are fewer. Traffic lights mostly work. Many parks are mowed. It is still a mess, just less of one.

There are crews on the streets and a call centre that answers. The fire brigade arrives on time. In my case, it did. Things get sorted, not always quickly, but they get done.

The past three weeks have been an eye-opener. I live in Ekurhuleni. I moved from Joburg for love and, as it turns out, for luck. Water leaks have plagued our neighbourhood in Benoni.

Each time a pipe burst, the water teams arrived within an hour, fixed it, and moved on. They are even digging up a road to deal with the root cause.

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When I lived in Joburg it took three years to sort out an electricity problem and that was when Herman Mashaba was mayor. Now the problems may outlive the residents.

A few weeks ago, I stop-started through a busy intersection with dead traffic lights. Four hours later the traffic lights were working. Ekurhuleni says it is struggling with cash, yet it has at least replaced some frequently stolen or crashed-into traffic lights with Stop signs to restore a semblance of order.

The city cleared a stormwater drain, covered a dangerous manhole on a nearby pavement and filled several potholes close to home. All in a single week.

The recipe for improvement is simple. Citizen activism. Zero tolerance for poor service. Hardworking ward councillors like Mary Goby and Simon Lapping of the DA.

And municipal officials who give a damn about the people who pay their salaries. Thokozane Maseko, head of water and sanitation in Ekurhuleni, is one of them.

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Call him and he knows what is potting, where teams are deployed and the state of the grid. He answers his phone, sends feedback and does not duck calls. It is admirable. And things happen. If more officials worked like Maseko, problems would be sorted out quickly.

If more ward councillors were as proactive and as passionate about their residents, life would be almost heaven, even with the malice and maladministration that lurk around every corner in local government.

To most Gautengers, South Africans in general, service delivery has become an unfunny joke. When people take delivery seriously, it must be recognised. All things being equal, Ekurhuleni is a major improvement on Joburg.

The metro has an app that mostly works, a call centre that answers faster than your insurance company and an emergency services department that does the same, usually.

Things kind of work, even though there is a long way to go. Joburg, on the other hand, seems to drive only in reverse and nobody is even looking in the rearview mirror at what’s coming.

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