The City of Cape Town has adopted its 2025/26 budget, titled “Invested in Hope”, despite strong opposition from political parties who accused the DA-led administration of misrepresenting the realities faced by poor and working-class communities.

Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis introduced the final budget during a sitting of the City Council on Thursday, highlighting a range of revisions aimed at easing cost burdens for pensioners and middle-income households while preserving the City’s multibillion-rand infrastructure investment programme.

“Our budget asks a little more of those who can afford it, while protecting basic services for those who can’t afford it,” Hill-Lewis told councillors.

“The budget was largely welcomed by lower-income residents, and we’ve also managed to significantly lower increases for middle-class residents, in the end building broad support for the budget across the city.”

The mayor announced significant enhancements to pensioner rebates, including a 100 percent rates and cleaning charge rebate for those earning up to R10,000 per month, up from the previous R7,500 threshold.

“A 50 percent rebate will now be available up to R20,000 income, 20% up to R24,000 income, and 10% up to the R27,000 max threshold,” he said.

He also revealed that 97% of ratepayers would avoid electricity tariff increases above 20%, thanks in part to the removal of a 10% city cleaning surcharge from electricity prices.

“Thousands of households will pay less to consume electricity from 1 July,” Hill-Lewis said.

Fixed water and sanitation charges, previously based on pipe size, will now be determined by property value.

The mayor said this would lead to lower fixed charges for homes valued under R2.5 million.

“Even when adding the new sanitation charge, 200,000 families in homes under R2.5 million will pay less fixed charges for Water and Sanitation together this year compared to what they would have paid on the pipe-size system.”

Addressing the retention of fixed charges linked to property value, Hill-Lewis said: “The only other alternative… is for everyone to pay a flat charge regardless of whether you are low-income or affluent. We must be clear that lower-income and wealthy households cannot make equal contributions… It’s not fair, nor sustainable.”

The final budget also introduced new debt write-off measures for qualifying households and organisations.

“Debt write-offs are not handouts,” said Hill-Lewis. “They are incentives for struggling households to make a payment arrangement and to, from a clean slate, begin making the necessary contributions to our City’s running.”

Those who may benefit include pensioners, social grant recipients, non-profit organisations, residents of city-owned rental stock, and property owners with debt older than one year.

The City also lowered the qualifying period for writing off outstanding debt on closed accounts from three years to one.

Despite these revisions, opposition councillors issued scathing rebukes of the budget and its priorities.

GOOD party councillor Axolile Notywala said: “The DA’s failures, lies and denialism in this budget are killing Black and Coloured children in Cape Town. Just yesterday, a child almost drowned while walking from school in a flooded street because the DA-led City of Cape Town failed to maintain drainage systems. This was in Parkwood, not in Clifton.”

Notywala accused the DA of using “PR stunts” while neglecting the infrastructure needs of poor communities.

“When you continue your PR stunts and governance, calling Cape Town the best-run City in South Africa, you are in clear denial of your deadly failures in Cape Town, as we witness children dying in Cape Town.”

ANC councillor Alderman Xolani Sotashe described the budget as “investing in falsehoods and continuous deception.”

Referring to the Freedom Charter, he said, “Whatever we do, we shall stay true to the core tenets of the Freedom Charter that are a stark reminder of the majority of Cape Town people who are still trapped in poverty and languishing in squalor while the minority continues to pass and implement oppressive and segregationist by-laws here in Cape Town.”

He added that many of the capital projects listed in the budget were not new.

“Some of the capital projects contained in this budget are as old as ten years, yet the mayor talks as if these projects are new. Service delivery delayed is service delivery denied.”

Sotashe also dismissed the City’s claims of strong public support, citing figures from the public participation process.

“The City has just received 3,134 comments from a population of just over five million. What a shame. For the first time in the history of this City, the poor and the rich are overwhelmingly rejecting this budget with 87 percent of the comments received expressing anger and disgust against this budget.”

According to the ANC, only two percent of public submissions supported the budget, while 11 percent were neutral.

Sotashe said key public concerns included the introduction of fixed charges, poor road and sanitation infrastructure, lack of enforcement of by-laws, poor maintenance of municipal facilities, and weak public engagement.

National Coloured Congress councillor Nasmi Jacobs also rejected the budget, accusing the City of misleading the public.

“Again, the public is deceived by the millions and billions made available, but in reality, our communities will not see that money,” he said.

“The same mayor couldn’t make R600 million work for staircases on the Cape Flats. So how would he be able to work with these billions?”

He said residents were struggling with basic needs while the City pushed ahead with large-scale infrastructure spending.

“The DA speaks of aqua and solar farms but our seniors on the Cape Flats are left without water and electricity. This budget is set to create more poverty.”

The Freedom Front Plus councillor Emre Uygun questioned the deployment of Law Enforcement to wards across the metro.

He said this would backfire on the City as it won’t keep criminals off the street due to poor convictions in courts and the city not having investigative powers.

“So this brings us to the big question: what motives or agendas lie beneath this massive increase in the budget?”Is it a ploy to boost service delivery right before the 2026 municipal elections or a broader strategy to further strain our rate-payers?”

Hill-Lewis concluded by defending the administration’s long-term vision.

“This is not just a budget. It is a declaration of intent: that Cape Town will not wait for a crisis to force our hand. We are budgeting for the next 20 years, not just the next 12 months. And yes to do this, we’ve had to make difficult decisions. But they are the right decisions for a city that is determined to be a city of hope for all.”

mandilakhe.tshwete@inl.co.za 

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