The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Johannesburg has formally served the City with legal papers to stop the implementation of an unfunded R10 billion salary agreement concluded with the South African Municipal Workers’ Union (SAMWU), which threatens to push the municipality deeper into a financial and service delivery crisis.
At a time when residents are experiencing dry taps, irregular refuse collection, deteriorating roads, power outages, and increasing lawlessness, the City has chosen to prioritise an unaffordable wage agreement over restoring basic services.
Instead of directing limited resources toward fixing pipes, repairing substations, maintaining roads, and restoring law and order, the administration is committing the City to a R10 billion agreement it cannot fund. The DA is not opposed to inflation based increases,
This decision is fiscally reckless and irresponsible. The DA is not opposed to fair and lawful wage negotiations or inflation aligned increases. However, any salary adjustment must be responsible, budgeted for, with proper financial analysis, and aligned with the City’s financial reality prior to final signed off agreements.
That money could and should be used for infrastructure maintenance, and basic service delivery.
Our legal action seeks to:
- Prevent the unlawful implementation of the unfunded R10 billion agreement;
- Compel full transparency regarding its financial implications; an
- Protect essential service delivery budgets from being diverted.
We have a constitutional duty to protect residents from financial mismanagement and to ensure that every rand is spent in the public interest.
The City cannot plead poverty when it comes to infrastructure maintenance, yet suddenly find R10 billion for an unfunded wage agreement. This contradiction exposes an administration that has lost its priorities.
Residents deserve water in their taps, working traffic lights, safe streets, and reliable basic services, not a government that places political agreements above people’s daily realities.
The DA will continue to use every lawful mechanism available, in Council and in court to defend residents and restore accountability to the City.