JOHANNESBURG, Gauteng — As the political battle for the City of Johannesburg heats up ahead of the November 2026 local government elections, Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) mayoral candidate Mlungisi Mabaso has outlined a comprehensive 100-day plan to tackle the city’s decaying infrastructure, persistent water outages, and potholes.
Mabaso, who currently serves as the city’s Member of the Mayoral Committee (MMC) for Human Settlements, stated that the IFP’s 2026 manifesto, initially presented in May, is built on delivering practical, immediate solutions to the economic hub’s most pressing service delivery challenges.
Shifting from Outsourcing to Internal Capacity
At the core of the IFP’s strategy for Johannesburg is a fundamental shift in how the city maintains its infrastructure. Mabaso criticized the municipality’s historical over-reliance on external service providers and lengthy supply chain procurement processes, which he argues cause severe delays in fixing basic issues like burst pipes.
“We cannot over-rely on external service providers for us to maintain our infrastructure,” Mabaso explained. “When there’s a burst pipe, within 24 hours that burst pipe must have been attended to, and the leakages must have been attended through the internal capacity.”
To achieve this, the IFP proposes a massive insourcing drive. The party plans to employ and train unemployed young people to form an in-house maintenance workforce. By utilizing full-time, internal staff rather than waiting for external contractors to be procured, the city could allegedly fix burst pipes and the resulting road damage much faster.
Combating Vandalism and Illegal Connections
Beyond routine maintenance, the IFP manifesto targets infrastructure vandalism and illegal water connections, which severely strain the city’s resources. Mabaso noted that the party intends to strictly enforce municipal bylaws to curb these issues.
As a practical measure, Mabaso highlighted ongoing collaborations with Job Water in informal segments. The strategy involves taking specific communities off the grid by installing blanking plates to manage illegal connections, ensuring that water is distributed legally and sustainably to residents while protecting the broader infrastructure from vandalism.
The 100-Day Implementation Timeline
When pressed on the logistical details of this insourcing strategy, Mabaso committed to a strict timeline. He confirmed that if the IFP is in a decision-making position following the 2026 elections, the foundational steps of this infrastructure turnaround will be initiated within the first 100 days in office.
“Within 100 days, we must have advertised, gotten the institutions of higher learning to assist with the training, and gotten SETAs into the process,” Mabaso stated, emphasizing that prioritizing infrastructure maintenance cannot be delayed once the new administration takes office.
Addressing Skepticism and Proof of Concept
The proposed solutions have faced scrutiny regarding their depth and feasibility, particularly concerning complex, historically entrenched infrastructure failures in areas like Cosmo City, where previous officials have cited underlying historical issues as barriers to quick fixes.
Defending the IFP’s approach, Mabaso insisted that while historical challenges exist, the immediate priority must be deploying experienced, in-house personnel to fix the physical infrastructure, such as burst pipes, before addressing the broader historical context.
To prove the viability of their policies, Mabaso pointed to the IFP’s governance track record in various municipalities across KwaZulu-Natal. He noted that IFP mayors in the province have successfully navigated severe historical challenges, including massive municipal debts and suspended accounts inherited from previous administrations. According to Mabaso, the same interventions, methods, and policies being pitched for Johannesburg are currently yielding positive outcomes and driving new water provision projects in KZN municipalities.
As the 2026 local government elections approach, the IFP’s focus remains firmly on presenting itself as a party with the experience, capacity, and practical expertise required to stabilize Johannesburg’s critical service delivery.