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Joburg Mom Faces Bankruptcy Over R2.9-Million Water Bill

Jenny-Lee Bot faces possible liquidation after getting a series of water bills averaging R250,000 per month.

  • A Johannesburg mother-of-two has a utility bill of close to R3-million, almost all of it water charges.
  • Several experts have indicated that the bill must be an error; there is simply no way a house can use that much water and not show signs of flooding.
  • But despite legal action, speaking to councillors and Members of Parliament, Bot cannot get the City of Johannesburg or Johannesburg Water to rectify the problem.

Jenny-Lee Bot rents out a house in Dainfern, Johannesburg. The income from the property is needed to support her family. In 2023, she got the shock of her life when she received her utility bill: water charges had increased from R1,334 due end of July to R454,192 due end of August.

This astronomical charge was based on a recorded consumption of nearly 6,000 kilolitres, a volume a professional plumber notes is “nearly impossible” for a residential unit in a single month. The huge charges continued for months. Bot’s water bill now exceeds R2.9-million.

In Gauteng, water consumption averages 279 litres per person per day. For a family of four, this is about 34kl per month.

Although a minor repair to a small pipe connector leak was carried out in February 2024, the extreme readings persisted, fluctuating between 1,420kl and 5,965kl, averaging a quarter-of-a-million rand monthly.

Then, the readings returned to normal without any major intervention. From June 2024 onward, consumption dropped to normal usage: between 10kl and 35kl per month.

The City of Johannesburg has maintained that the high consumption was due to an “internal leak,” placing the financial burden squarely on Bot. Johannesburg Water, in a message to GroundUp, also blamed the problem on Bot.

However, independent investigations contradict this.

“On a 1,000 square metre stand, the volume of water the bill shows is 5.965-million litres in one month. But you would see signs, swamp, sink holes, wet walls, mud patches and running water – none of which I can find. So the 12 months of high water bills make no sense,” said Simon Bird from SAB Plumbing.

An engineer consulted by Bot found that this was “clearly a case of either water meter failure, incorrect reading of the water meter and/or … miscalculation by the administrator of the water bill invoices”.

In May 2024, Alpha Plumbing conducted a high-pressure gas test, certifying the “absolute absence of any active leaks” on the property.

Yet the City insists on a 50% upfront payment before engaging in any formal dispute resolution.

Johannesburg Water told us that the “request to adjust account due to high consumption” had not been processed, as “there was [an] internal leak which was owner’s responsibility”. The company said there was “high consumption” on the property between 21 March 2023 and 16 April 2024, and this had not been fixed by a Johannesburg Water technical team, so the account could not be adjusted. But this claim is inconsistent with the expert reports as well as with the fact that Bot’s bill only started ballooning several months later.

Sections of two municipal bills that Bot’s rental business has received: over R477,000 due end of August 2023 and over R2.9-million due end of April.

Faced with a bill she cannot pay, Bot is at risk of going bankrupt.

“I lose sleep over this matter, and it is insane that such a huge mistake can put me in liquidation if I cannot find a remedy,” Bot told GroundUp.

Bot says she has been pushed from “pillar to post” these past two years. She has made dozens of visits to Johannesburg Water, had meetings with lawyers, councillors and even MPs, and written to Johannesburg’s Ombudsman.

At one point, she even paid the City for a meter test. But she says she the test never actually took place.

Bot also alleges corruption – she says that during her desperate search for a solution, Johannesburg Water officials told her it would be “very expensive,” but they could make the bill “go away”.

Financial toll

The repeated service disconnections caused by the dispute led to her tenants cancelling their lease.

This loss of income resulted in a final demand from her bank and a lawyer’s letter, threatening her with liquidation.

In 2024, Bot obtained a court interdict to keep the lights and water on. But, the City subcontracts disconnections, and the order has not been honoured, according to Bot, and disconnections continue.

She cannot afford to spend much on lawyers.

The utility company has a history of faulty meter readings, particularly following the 2008 Project Phakama centralisation. Errors have been the result of a lack of physical readings, causing many households to be billed for months or even years based on arbitrary estimates.

“I honestly feel like I’m in a nightmare,” said Bot. “It’s too much stress.”

© 2026 GroundUp. This article is published under the GroundUp Republication Licence Version 1.0. Email [email protected] to request permission to republish.

Lack of community participation: Limited involvement of communities in decision-making processes.

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Source – MyZA

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The Oriental Plaza: A Phoenix in Fordsburg

If Johannesburg is a city of forced displacements, the Oriental Plaza is its most resilient response. While the Rand Club was built for the elite and Ponte for the “jet-set,” the Oriental Plaza was born from the trauma of the Group Areas Act—a piece of Apartheid legislation designed to geographically separate the races. Yet, in true Johannesburg fashion, what was intended as a tool of containment and financial ruin for the Indian community transformed into one of the most vibrant, independent commercial powerhouses in the country.

The story of the Plaza begins with the destruction of Pageview, affectionately known as Fietas. In the mid-20th century, Fietas was a legendary multicultural hub, centered around the bustling 14th Street. It was the city’s premier destination for textiles, clothing, and spices, where shoppers of all races would rub shoulders in a “jazzy, soulful” atmosphere. However, because Fietas was located so close to the white-only city center, the Apartheid government declared it a “white area” in 1962. The community fought back for decades, but by the 1970s, the bulldozers arrived. Homes were leveled, and the thriving traders of 14th Street were forcibly relocated to a purpose-built, modernist complex a kilometer away in Fordsburg: the Oriental Plaza.

The government’s intent was cynical: by moving the traders into a controlled environment with high state-mandated rents and strict rules on what could be sold, they hoped to break the back of Indian commercial dominance. The early years were devastating; many businesses folded, and the “Grand Bazaar” felt like a sterile warehouse compared to the street-level energy of Fietas. However, the traders refused to vanish. They eventually won the right to purchase their own shops, making the Oriental Plaza unique among South African malls because it is owned by the shopkeepers themselves rather than a corporate landlord. This ownership model changed everything. Without the burden of massive monthly mall rentals, the 360+ independent stores can offer prices that national retailers cannot touch, turning the Plaza into a “bargain-hunter’s paradise” that draws millions of visitors a year.