Cape Town – Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has announced a record Cape Town capital expenditure tally of more than R12,2bn for the 2025/26 financial year.
“The record R12.24bn capital investment in this past financial year demonstrates not only to Capetonians – but to South Africans right across the country – what it takes to build for the future, to build a City of Hope,” Hill-Lewis said on Thursday, 30 July 2026.
“Not a day goes by that we don’t read another heartbreaking report of the decay, neglect and collapse of public infrastructure in so many of our country’s other cities and towns.
“We made a vow that this would never happen to Cape Town.”
Mayor Hill-Lewis recalled that when he started this term of office, the City could achieve no more than R6bn investment in a year, “but now we have more than doubled that to over R12bn”.
Mayor Hill-Lewis added: “I firmly believe this is the minimum required investment that Cape Town – and every other major metro in the country – should be making in basic infrastructure every year as a golden rule, growing annually to account for inflation and population growth.
“Whether it is pipe replacement across our water and sewer network, the massive upgrades to our wastewater treatment works, the new Cape Flats MyCiti route across the Cape Flats to Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain, critical investments to our electricity grid, informal settlements upgrade programmes, or any of the hundreds of projects to improve public amenities, roads, waterways and public spaces – each and every one of them is vital to Cape Town’s future.”
He said the City’s top three directorates for percentage of budget spent were Safety and Security (99,85%), Finance (99,45%), and Urban Waste Management (98,37%).
Of the directorates in the City’s ‘billion club’ with major investment portfolios of highly complex projects, Energy spent 96,53% (R1,29bn) of its budget, followed by Human Settlements (93,38% or R1,34bn) and Water and Sanitation (92,1% or R4,47bn).
Mayor Hill-Lewis said the City’s water and sanitation investment was bigger than the entire capital budget of most cities.
“On the very first day of this term of office I went to Khayelitsha and deliberately stood at an overflowing sewer, and said this must change,” he said.
“At that time, the City was replacing and upgrading just 25km of sewer pipes each year. Since then, we have set our target at 100km a year.
“Both the largest and the second largest sewer pipe upgrade projects in South Africa are currently under construction here in Cape Town, being the Cape Flats main sewer upgrade and the Philippi main line upgrade.
“We have seen sewer spills and blockages come down across the city by 33% in this term. Still much to do, but also much progress to celebrate.”
Construction jobs generated
Around 130 000 construction-related jobs will flow from capital investment in the current term of office alone, according to City estimates.
“When we published our first annual Infrastructure Report, the pipe laying companies told me they could not handle the amount of pipe replacements we wanted to do,” Mayor Hill-Lewis said.
“But over the course of this term, they and many other construction firms and engineering firms all around South Africa have risen to the occasion.
“They’ve scaled up, and hired many more professionals, because of the investments we have made here. I want to thank them too,’ said Mayor Hill-Lewis.
At least 75% of spend benefits lower-income homes
Around 75% of Cape Town’s infrastructure investment directly benefits lower-income households based on the City’s estimates for the 2025/26 capital budget.
Infrastructure investment highlights over the next three years include:
- R16,7bn water and sanitation investment – 40% of total spending – including major wastewater works upgrades, quadrupled pipe replacement (a R2bn project), and expanded water supply sources
- R6bn in electrical grid upgrades and maintenance to prepare for a decentralised energy future with less Eskom reliance
- R3,7bn in road maintenance, pothole repairs, upgrades to roads and stormwater, and R653m in congestion relief projects
- A further R3,2 billion for the major MyCiTi Cape Flats expansion, the biggest of its kind in South Africa.
- R3,3bn for informal settlement upgrading and state-subsidised housing
- A further R203m for sports facility upgrades
- R300m for the Strandfontein Pavilion redevelopment
See the Mayor’s full address to City Council.
