A view of Mpophomeni, uMngeni’s largest township; GroundUp reported on a protest in 2024 after municipal officials refused to replace a transformer unless they could do an electricity audit of the area. Photos: Joseph Bracken
- UMngeni Local Municipality Mayor Christopher Pappas says a programme to install smart meters for electricity will generate about R900,000 additional revenue a month.
- The municipality used to lose almost 60% of its electricity. Through various measures, the municipality is now expecting losses of about 27% in 2025/26.
- Some Mpophomeni residents welcome efforts to curb illegal connections but some say they cannot afford electricity at current prices.
The uMngeni Local Municipality in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands has spent millions installing almost 2,000 electricity smart meters to combat illegal connections and tampering.
The push for smart meters comes after a decade of losses. At one point, more than 60% of total electricity purchased from Eskom was lost, costing uMngeni up to R83-million a year.
In recent years, the municipality has halved this figure, and the smart meter programme has already raised millions in revenue since the first installations, Mayor Christopher Pappas told GroundUp.
However, not all residents have been happy with the rollout, with some residents complaining that they cannot afford the electricity costs.
Mayor Christopher Pappas speaks with a man building his home with materials provided by the municipality.
The municipality has spent R5.7-million to buy and install 1,885 smart meters in homes that have either never had meters or needed old meters replaced, Pappas said. R36-million is required to complete the project. The municipality intends to use reallocated budgets and money recovered from uMngeni-uThukela Water (UT).
The programme has been largely successful, bringing electricity consumption down and generating millions in extra revenue, according to Pappas.
In July, the municipality generated an additional R1-million from the new smart meters, and Pappas expects them to generate about R900,000 monthly in additional revenue.
Last year, uMngeni applied for a National Treasury programme to help municipalities tackle electricity losses by supplying funding for new infrastructure, said Pappas.
But the Treasury denied its application, saying it only assists municipalities that default on Eskom, said Pappas.
In response, the municipality threatened to purposefully default so it could be considered for the programme, said Pappas. However, the municipality ended up paying Eskom to keep up its good relationship with the entity, he said.
“Instead of being proactive, National Treasury waits until you are defaulting and then says that they can help you,” said Pappas.
Recently, the municipality also discovered that it had underbilled UT for electricity for its treatment plant in Mpophomeni for almost 20 years, said Pappas. This underbilling cost the municipality R25-million.
The money UT has agreed to pay back will be ring-fenced for the smart metering project, said Pappas. “I’d love to spend it on potholes or streetlights and all the things that people see and complain about, but the responsible thing to do is to plug the hole in our current finances.”
Mbuyiselo Shasha, a resident of Tumbleweed township in Howick, inside his new home built with materials provided by the municipality.
A decade of loss
Electricity losses were around 60% of total electricity purchased during the previous council and administration’s tenure. According to the municipality’s audited financial statements, it experienced losses of almost R75-million in 2018/19 and over R83-million in 2019/20.
The 2020/21 and 2021/22 financial years were anomalies, when electricity losses dropped to about R20-million and R12.6-million or 16% and 7% of total electricity purchased. According to councillor Pam Passmoor, finance committee chairperson, this was due to a temporary change in the way electricity losses were reported.
Since that temporary drop, the loss rocketed back up to 34% in 2024/25.
The municipality is looking at around 27% in electricity losses for the 2025/26 financial year, Pappas told GroundUp.
The municipality is also addressing losses due to illegal connections. When a transformer is damaged or breaks, the municipality will only reconnect or replace it if it can conduct an electricity audit, Pappas said.
GroundUp reported on a protest in 2024 after officials refused to replace a transformer in Mpophomeni, uMngeni’s largest township, unless they could audit the area. An audit later found that over 90% of households there were illegally connected.
A leaking tap in an informal settlement on the outskirts of Howick. UMngeni has expressed dissatisfaction with the district municipality over its handling of water and sewage leaks.
On the grid
Mayvis Mabuso, a pensioner living in Mpophomeni, told GroundUp that electricity theft is rife in ward 13, where she lives with her children.
She said many people have recently come into the area and built homes informally, without planning permission and illegally connected to the electricity of other people’s homes.
Ward 13 was not a part of the initial rollout of the new smart metering system, but the community is hoping that there will soon be a solution to the electricity theft in the area, she said.
But some residents who have received the new smart meters complain that they cannot afford the high prices of electricity units. Njabulo Mnguni in Mpophomeni received a smart meter two months ago. He said he is struggling to afford enough units just to keep his lights on.
Bonginkosi Ndlovu, project coordinator for the Zenzeleni Community Centre, the oldest NGO in uMngeni, said there are many people who do not meet the criteria for indigent allowances but cannot afford the current high electricity prices. He suggested a flat rate for a set amount of electricity each month based on their income.
In March, Soweto residents protested at NERSA’s offices, demanding such a flat-rate electricity tariff.
But Pappas believes “a user pay system with assistance for indigent households is the fairest and most sustainable method”.
Pappas said people take a while to adjust to having to pay for electricity after meters are installed.
“The meters not only help with paying our Eskom account but they also help to reduce the pressure on infrastructure as households start to use electricity more efficiently,” he said.
Thandazile Makhaye, a resident of Mpophomeni, looking at her smart meter. She said she has had to cut back on electricity usage since the municipality installed it in July. She has switched to gas to cook, but her electricity bill is still around R600 a month.
Next steps
In his bid to get re-elected on 4 November, Pappas has made several promises, including strategic litigation against other government entities.
The uMgungundlovu District Municipality, responsible for uMngeni’s water and wastewater infrastructure, has severely neglected sewage leaks, said Pappas.
Raw sewage currently flows into local rivers and streams, moving downstream towards Albert Falls Dam, a major water source for KZN, said Pappas. The municipality will litigate to hold uMgungundlovu accountable and stop further environmental damage.
When GroundUp visited Howick South, there was sewage leaking onto roads in numerous areas.
Pappas said municipal officials report leaks directly to the district municipality, but still struggle to get anyone to come out and fix them.
The municipality is also planning to take Transnet to court for not looking after its properties, which has led to illegal dumping and informal settlements popping up, said Pappas.
“They’re basically absentee landlords,” he said.
UMngeni is also currently in the process of taking the Msunduzi Municipality to court for operating without an electricity licence. Ratepayers in Hilton, a suburb that falls under uMngeni, buy electricity from Msunduzi even though the suburb does not fall under its region.
According to Pappas, Msunduzi has been supplying electricity to this area without the required licence that would allow them to do so. The municipality was also meant to hand the role of electricity supplier in this area over to uMngeni years ago, he said.
The case is expected to be heard at the Pietermaritzburg High Court in the first quarter of next year, said Pappas.
The interior of an almost complete house built from materials provided by the municipality.
Housing project
In Tumbleweed in Howick South, GroundUp visited a beneficiary of the municipality’s mud house eradication programme. Mbuyiselo Shasha, who is in his 80s and has lived in the area for most of his life, was able to leave his mud house and move into a new home built with materials provided by the municipality.
The project started in the 2023/24 financial year. Beneficiaries receive around R38,000 worth of building materials, enough to build a two-room house. Since its inception, 28 families have benefited.
The home of Sindiswe Hlongwane in Mpophomeni was damaged by several floods between 2004 and 2026, leaving it dilapidated and difficult to repair. Politicians would visit and make promises to assist, but nothing ever came of it, she said.
“In 2025, provincial disaster management came and gave us blankets, but we didn’t need blankets, we needed a house.”
But this year, Hlongwane was chosen for the building materials programme. With the help of her four sons, she built a house.
“I’m very happy. More than happy. I’m overwhelmed,” she told GroundUp.
A handover
In 2021, the DA won uMngeni with 47%, beating the incumbent ANC, which received 39%. It was the first municipality ever to be won by the DA in KZN. The election saw the ANC’s vote plunge from about 56% in 2016 and the DA rise from 41%.
UMgungundlovu, the district municipality that uMngeni is planning to take to court, is under the control of the ANC, and has been since it was formed in 2000. In the 2021 elections, the ANC won nearly 52% of the votes across all seven of the local municipalities that fall under uMgungundlovu. UMngeni was the only local municipality where the ANC did not win the most district votes.
Since the new council and administration took over there have been improvements in governance. Accumulated unauthorised expenditure went from R269-million in 2021 to just R3.2-million in 2025. Accumulated irregular expenditure dropped from R51-million to R31-million over the same period.
These huge reductions were largely aided by write-offs of the historical unauthorised expenditure balance: R238-million in 2023 and R146-million in 2024.
In 2022, the municipality received its first unqualified audit in three years. Since then, the municipality has continued to receive unqualified audits.
Women from a sewing machine co-op gather for the handing over of new sewing machines from the municipality.