OUR CITY NEWS: IFP’s Mlungisi Mabaso claims to know Joburg inside out, but can he fix it?

Mlungisi Mabaso might be the first politician running to become Johannesburg’s mayor who openly admits to being boring.Ask the Inkatha Freedom Party’s (IFP) mayoral candidate what he enjoys doing in South Africa’s biggest city, and there are no favourite restaurants, weekend hangouts or particularly cherished places. His days are divided between government work, party responsibilities, studying and his small business. Whatever time remains is generally spent at home.“I don’t have a personal life. I can tell you for sure. I’m boring,” he said, laughing at the suggestion that other politicians seem to lead rather more colourful lives.For Mabaso, who recently completed a master’s degree in public management while serving as Johannesburg’s mayoral committee member for human settlements and holding a senior position in the IFP Youth Brigade, the demanding schedule has become something of a way of life.It is perhaps fitting that the IFP has entrusted its Johannesburg mayoral ambitions to someone who appears to find considerably more excitement in municipal administration than in what the city has to offer outside working hours.Mlungisi Mabaso. (Photo: Our City News / Tebogo Letsie) Originally from KwaZulu-Natal, Mabaso has lived in Johannesburg for two decades and served on its council for the past 10 years, including two stints as MMC for human settlements. He believes that experience gives him an advantage over candidates less familiar with the city’s administration. For Mabaso, familiarity with the city’s administration means he would not need to spend his first months learning how the municipality operates or finding his way around its complicated structures.“I won’t be getting to the office to ask where is the office of the mayor, where are the toilets, where is the kitchen, because I’ve been in the system for quite some time,” he said, quipping that he does not even need a GPS to find his way around Johannesburg.Knowing how the city worksMabaso believes Johannesburg already possesses much of what it needs to recover, but has suffered from poor management, inadequate maintenance and a lack of political will. He points to his record in human settlements, including the approval of a hostel redevelopment strategy, policies to better manage informal settlements, partnerships with private housing developers and the acquisition of inner-city properties for social housing. Much of this work remains at various stages of implementation.His proposals reflect the IFP’s 10-point Johannesburg rescue plan and its 2026 local government manifesto, which prioritise economic recovery, infrastructure maintenance, employment, stronger municipal finances and restoring law and order.One of his central proposals is to rebuild the City’s internal maintenance capacity, employing and training young people to repair infrastructure instead of relying so heavily on external contractors. “You don’t really need to engage in a supply chain process to have your burst pipe repaired, to have your leaking taps fixed, to have your outages dealt with… You need dedicated full-time staff that is employed by the government to maintain the infrastructure,” he argued.Within his first 100 days, Mabaso wants to launch a Johannesburg Economic Recovery Plan, begin recruiting additional Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department officers, introduce more surveillance technology and establish teams to tackle crime, undocumented migration and the city’s struggling tourism sector.He also wants to accelerate the formalisation of informal settlements, estimating that between 60 and 70 could be formalised annually, while continuing hostel redevelopment and expanding housing delivery.These ambitions confront the City’s financial difficulties, but Mabaso disputes the argument that Johannesburg simply lacks money. “I really don’t believe this thing that the City of Johannesburg doesn’t have money. We are just not collecting it,” he said, claiming that more than 190,000 municipal accounts lack contact details and are not being properly billed.As the sun sets on the intersection of Queen Street and Albertina Sisulu Road in Kensington, protesters wave placards highlighting their anger at prolonged water outages on 29 October 2026. (Photo: Jamie Ho) Law, order and political compromiseUndocumented migration is another central part of Mabaso’s agenda, and one on which he expresses particularly strong opinions. He blames undocumented migrants for illegal electricity connections, pressure on municipal services and criminal activity, although he provides no evidence to substantiate his broader allegations.As MMC, Mabaso has participated in operations targeting migrants and businesses in Johannesburg’s inner city, some of which have faced criticism over their legality. In July, GroundUp reported that lawyers from the Socio-Economic Rights Institute intervened to stop an attempted door-to-door search for undocumented migrants at Wemmer Shelter, where Mabaso was present. The lawyers argued that officials lacked the necessary warrant or court order.Mabaso rejects suggestions that his views amount to xenophobia, arguing that enforcing immigration laws and protecting economic opportunities should not be confused with prejudice.He takes a more accommodating position towards political opponents, arguing that the IFP’s experience working with parties across the political spectrum makes it well suited to coalition government and believes that the current administration, of which he is part, has brought greater stability to Johannesburg since 2024, although the City’s continuing difficulties raise questions about how much a Mabaso mayoralty would change.For all his insistence that he has little life outside politics, Mabaso eventually admits to one enduring distraction: football. A devoted Kaizer Chiefs and Liverpool supporter, he rarely misses a match, even when his teams repeatedly disappoint him.“We are in an abusive relationship there,” he jokes about Chiefs, explaining that years of frustration have done little to diminish his loyalty.It is a familiar relationship for many Johannesburg residents, who have watched their city struggle through years of decline while hoping that its fortunes might eventually improve. DMThis interview is part of an ongoing series by Our City News featuring key mayoral candidates contesting the City of Johannesburg in the upcoming local government elections.