{"id":882047,"date":"2026-11-01T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-11-01T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=882047"},"modified":"2026-10-30T15:55:37","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T13:55:37","slug":"government-punishing-homeowners-with-a-triple-tax-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/882047\/government-punishing-homeowners-with-a-triple-tax-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Government punishing homeowners with a triple tax in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

South African homeowners are paying three times over to secure basic services, as unreliable municipal electricity and water supplies push households to invest in private alternatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first cost of this \u2018triple tax\u2019 involves paying municipalities for services such as water and electricity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second is spending thousands of rands on solar panels, batteries, and boreholes when public services fail. The final \u2018tax\u2019 is then paying additional municipal fees or levies to maintain or use those private systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The growing dispute over these charges raises questions about whether residents are being unfairly penalised for trying to protect themselves against deteriorating infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In defence of these additional levies, municipalities argue that they must maintain networks and recover the costs of providing services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, homeowners and civil rights groups argue that these charges should be properly justified, particularly when residents receive little or no reliable service in return.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem has become more visible as households move away from relying entirely on municipal infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Eskom\u2019s data, private rooftop solar capacity has exceeded 9 GW, while Stats SA\u2019s household survey data show that water interruptions have escalated in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eskom’s achievement of more than 500 consecutive days without national load shedding has not eliminated local electricity outages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transformer failures, cable theft, and municipal distribution problems continue to leave households without power for extended periods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Water shortages have created a similar problem. Johannesburg Water has reported significant losses due to leaks and ageing infrastructure, while supply restrictions and reservoir shortages have led to recurring interruptions across several metropolitan areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Residents have increasingly turned to boreholes, water tanks, and private pumps to secure a reliable supply. However, some municipalities are charging homeowners monthly fees for these alternatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Mbombela, residential borehole owners pay R406.50 per borehole per month, while businesses pay R877.12 per borehole per month. Properties with multiple boreholes can face charges totalling R8,953.20 a month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Push back <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Freedom Front Plus councillor Ken Robertson has criticised the Mbombela Local Municipality for maintaining these tariffs despite ongoing water shortages affecting communities across its jurisdiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The municipality recently rejected a party motion to scrap the monthly charges. Other municipalities have introduced their own charges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mangaung maintains a monthly borehole service fee of R70 for properties without municipal water meters, while a R133 monthly borehole tariff in Vryheid, under the Abaqulusi Local Municipality, has also sparked outrage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AfriForum’s environmental affairs manager, Lambert de Klerk, said municipalities needed to distinguish between different uses of groundwater when calculating charges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is a significant difference between someone who uses borehole water for household purposes and someone who uses their borehole exclusively to water their garden,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf the water does not enter the municipal sewage system, one has to ask on what grounds the resident is required to pay the same fixed sewerage levy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Thaba Chweu Local Municipality, the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) approved a monthly levy of R582.64 for electricity networks that are available but not connected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The municipality also charges small-scale embedded generation customers a basic fee of R321.11 and an access charge of R10.92 a month, with these charges introduced in July 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AfriForum raised concerns that the additional levy was being applied to properties completely disconnected from the electricity grid, potentially requiring residents to pay for infrastructure they do not use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The organisation argued that the levy could amount to an unlawful tax if it was not supported by a lawful and transparent process, an appropriate cost-of-supply study, and the necessary approvals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Municipalities maintain that fixed network charges help cover infrastructure costs because some households with solar systems continue to rely on the grid as backup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South African homeowners are paying three times over to secure basic services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":882084,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2116758392974852306","_sma_facebook_post_id":"191437357620492_2256681005152298","_sma_instagram_post_id":"17973347409188212","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[2419,26989,1164,5853,8540,853],"class_list":["post-882047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-afriforum","tag-boreholes","tag-eskom","tag-freedom-front-plus","tag-solar","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882047","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\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=882047"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882047\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":882085,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882047\/revisions\/882085"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/882084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=882047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=882047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=882047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}