{"id":856396,"date":"2026-04-13T13:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T11:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=856396"},"modified":"2026-04-13T13:37:22","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T11:37:22","slug":"government-employees-own-a-huge-chunk-of-south-african-smart-city-worth-r14-8-billion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/856396\/government-employees-own-a-huge-chunk-of-south-african-smart-city-worth-r14-8-billion\/","title":{"rendered":"Government employees own a huge chunk of South African smart city worth R14.8 billion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The pensions of government employees own a 30% stake in Waterfall City in Northern Johannesburg, which is one of the nation’s premier property destinations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Waterfall City is home to South Africa’s busiest mall, Mall of Africa, the PwC tower and a host of other residential and office developments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As reported by MyBroadband<\/a>, the 2,200-hectare precinct is unique as it lies on land that cannot be bought or sold as it is a waqf, an Islamic charitable endowment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every resident and business operates under a 99-year leasehold agreement rather than freehold or sectional title ownership. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attacq owns leasehold interests in Waterfall City through a 70%-owned subsidiary. Its investment property valuation in the precinct grew by 3.8% to R14.8 billion by the end of 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Government Employees Pension Fund (GEPF), which is managed by the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), acquired the remaining 30% stake in the owner of Waterfall City in 2023. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The PIC bought a 30% stake in Attacq Waterfall Investment Corporation (AWIC) in a deal valued at R2.7 billion, made up of R2.4 billion in cash and an additional R300 million as a shareholder loan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The PIC is South Africa’s largest asset manager, with R3 trillion in assets under management. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These assets are primarily from the GEPF, meaning government employees’ funds carry significant weight in South African markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major plans for the development<\/h2>\n\n\n
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Attacq CEO Jackie van Niekerk and Deputy Finance Minister David Masondo<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Deputy Finance Minister David Masondo, who is also the chair of the PIC, conducted an oversight visit to Waterfall City. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Masondo called Waterfall City one of the PIC’s flagship investments and a “clear demonstration of how pension fund capital can be deployed to build South Africa\u2019s economic future.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The precinct itself supports just under 23,000 jobs and anchors a vast amount of retail, commercial, logistics and residential activity at scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“What stands out about Waterfall City is not only its size, but its role in shaping a modern, competitive and sustainable urban economy,” the Deputy Minister said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This is the kind of infrastructure South Africa needs to attract investment, unlock growth and support businesses to thrive.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He noted that the PIC is deliberate in how it deploys capital and plans to conduct further oversight visits in the coming months to its major investments. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We are active stewards of public servants\u2019 savings, ensuring that every investment is well-governed, value-accretive, and contributes meaningfully to economic development and transformation,” he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the PIC is prominent across South African markets, many of its investments have struggled. This includes chicken producer Daybreak Foods<\/a>, which is under business rescue, and the PIC plans to exit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Waterfall City is undergoing a series of further developments, including Aspire Waterfall City, which was launched in May 2025 and is the group’s next residential development. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The development follows the success of the Ellipse Waterfall residential development and will comprise a 20-storey residential tower, with a mixed-use component. AWIC holds a 25% stake in the development. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Waterfall City will also soon get a new conference centre and hotel, which will be on the south-eastern corner of Mall of Africa. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another upgrade involving the Mall of Africa is the repurposing of the existing public transport facility on the western side of the mall to accommodate the ultra-luxury food retailer, The Pantry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Government employees own a 30% chunk of Waterfall City in Johannesburg via their pensions, which are managed by the Public Investment Corporation. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95,"featured_media":856418,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[11493,23416,2994,17395],"class_list":["post-856396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-attacq","tag-gepf","tag-pic","tag-waterfall-city"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/95"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=856396"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":857006,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856396\/revisions\/857006"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/856418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=856396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=856396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=856396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}