Photo byPer-Anders Pettersson/Getty Images
During the month of February, the tabling of the national budget, and the debates that follow, generate a lot of attention. Municipalities, as part of the Division of Revenue Act, get allocated a share of funds for a variety of services. Very little attention is paid to — and no rigorous analysis done — when it comes to municipal budget allocations.
Metropolitan municipalities, such as the City of Cape Town, also raise a big chunk of their revenue on their own mainly through property rates and taxes. The city’s 2024-25 budget is R76.4 billion.
With the important role municipalities play in the delivery of equitable basic services and infrastructure development, we do a disservice to the majority of South Africans when we don’t interrogate and challenge municipal budget allocations.
In Cape Town, black and coloured people make up more than 80% of the population. These are the people who continue to be the most marginalised and live in poverty, who are politically and economically excluded, and who face daily violence from criminals, gangs and extortionists. Politics and political decisions are at the centre of this marginalisation and daily violence.
With poverty listed as a ground for discrimination, since the groundbreaking judgment in the Social Justice Coalition and Others vs Minister of Police and Others at the equality court in 2018, and with South Africa having the highest rate of inequality in the world, it becomes more and more important to pay attention to how resources within our municipalities get allocated and whether this discrimination exists or not.
It is my assertion that in the City of Cape Town’s budget allocations, discrimination on the basis of race and poverty exists — despite the Democratic Alliance’s (DA) claim that it spends 75% of its budget in poor communities.
I have lived in Khayelitsha for 28 years, since 1995. Khayelitsha is one of the many townships in Cape Town which have the highest rates of crime and violence in South Africa. It suffers high levels of poverty, poor service delivery and underdevelopment.
I grew up in an informal settlement in an area called Green Point. My family and I had to use the bush, and at times a bucket, to relieve ourselves. Many other families and people living in informal settlements in Cape Town have experienced such indignities for as long as 40 years. There are over 100 pockets of informal settlement in Khayelitsha alone without adequate and dignified basic services.
From testimony provided by Josette Cole in 2014 to the Khayelitsha Commission of Inquiry, the announcement for the establishment of Khayelitsha was made on 30 March 1983 by National Party cabinet minister Piet Koornhoof: “A tin hut would be erected on each plot for each family. The value of the hut was put at R1 010 in 1983 figures. One tap would be provided for each four plots, one bucket toilet per family, high-mast street lighting and a refuse removal service …”
Forty-two years later, many of the service standards announced for Khayelitsha by the apartheid cabinet minister remain, and are in many ways maintained, by the current municipal government. Go to any informal settlement in Khayelitsha today and I will show you these apartheid service standards.
One the oldest informal settlements in Khayelitsha is Barney Molokoane Section (BM Section), established in 1987. Since then, for 38 years, thousands of people in BM Section live in tin huts, with taps shared by more than 20 households, families using bucket toilets that are shared by more than five households, with high-mast lights that are frequently defective and cast dark shadows in informal settlement pathways, therefore providing no safety, and with inconsistent and inadequate refuse removal services.
There are hundreds of thousands more people across Cape Town’s townships and informal settlements living this reality today. DA federal chairperson Helen Zille can sit in the comfort of her home and post on X that, “The city and the province do their job in Khayelitsha” but she does not live this reality.
My life experiences over a number of years, and the experiences of millions of primarily black and coloured South Africans who live in Cape Town, tell a story of a city that not only does not care, but one that institutionally and structurally discriminates on the basis of race and poverty. These experiences tell a story of an Apartheid City that has been unashamedly consistent in its discriminatory and racist ways.
The best indicator of discrimination is Cape Town’s budget allocation.
Having lived in Khayelitsha for most of my life, I am now privileged enough to live in Salt River, which is in ward 57 and part of subcouncil 16 in Cape Town. Subcouncil 16 consists of five wards that include some of the wealthiest areas of Cape Town such as Camps Bay, Sea Point, Bantry Bay, Clifton, Cape Town City Centre, Gardens, Vredehoek, Green Point. Areas like Epping, Pinelands, Thornton, Maitland, District Six, Mowbray, Observatory, Woodstock, Bo-Kaap, Salt River and surrounds also form part of it.
Subcouncils are delegated certain powers, such as making recommendations to the executive mayor on the City of Cape Town’s Integrated Development Plan and the budget and have the authority to make decisions on a range of municipal matters. Subcouncil capital expenditure reports and budget allocations provide a certain level of disaggregation which allows for geographical analysis of budget allocations and spending.
I have been serving as a proportional representative councillor in subcouncil 16, with the Good party, for six months. The subcouncil has a total of nine councillors with me being the only non-DA councillor. As part of subcouncil 16, I have mostly observed and studied capital expenditure reports and allocations. Through these reports I can, for example, see how much money the City of Cape Town allocates to poor communities such as Khayelitsha versus wealthier ones such as Camps Bay and others.
According to census data accessed from Wazi Maps, the average household income in the six wards within subcouncil 9 in Khayelitsha is between R14 600 and R29 400, while the average household income in the five wards within subcouncil 16 is between R115 100 and R230 700.
Now, comparing capital expenditure reports and allocations to subcouncil 9 in Khayelitsha where BM Section, one of the oldest and biggest informal settlements in Cape Town, to subcouncil 16, one of the wealthiest subcouncils in Cape Town, the pro-poor argument of the City of Cape Town holds no water.
In the 2022-23 financial year, subcouncil 9 had a total capital allocation of R35 698 736 while subcouncil 16 had a total of R103 095 686, almost three times more than that of the poorer subcouncil in Khayelitsha.
In the 2023-24 financial year, subcouncil 9 had a total capital allocation of R42 025 501
while subcouncil 16 had a total of R218 899 861, five times more than that of the poorer subcouncil in Khayelitsha.
In the 2024-25 financial year, subcouncil 9 had a total capital allocation of R65 951 941
while subcouncil 16 had a total of R249 249 327, almost four times more than that of the poorer subcouncil in Khayelitsha.
Subcouncil 16, for example, has a total capital allocation of R249 249 327 for 2024-25, while one of the subcouncils in Khayelitsha, which has a higher population than subcouncil 16 and is far less developed, has a total allocation of R65 951 941 for 2024-25.
So, over the past three financial years, the poorer subcouncil 9 in Khayelitsha has received a total capital allocation of R143 676 205, while the wealthier subcouncil 16 in the city centre and surrounds received a total of R571 244 874. In what world is this a pro-poor budget?
This is the kind of budgeting we need to pay attention to and challenge. We cannot simply accept the claim that the City of Cape Town spends 75% of its budget in poor communities.
Axolile Notywala is a proportional representative councillor in subcouncil 16 in Cape Town for the Good party.