Imagine being able to report a pothole, a broken streetlight, or a flooded road from your phone and actually get a response. For millions of South Africans, service delivery failures are part of everyday life. Frustration is common, but change is rare. One student is trying to fix that.
City Menders is South Africa’s first nationwide service delivery tracking app.
“It is a service delivery tracking tool that works across the country,” says Keyuren Maharaj, a 23-year-old mechanical engineering student at UKZN.
The app is simple. “You download it, it is free, and there is no registration. We do not collect any personal data. I do not believe that you should have to give your details or your address just to log an issue,” Keyuren explains.
City Menders covers a wide range of problems. “You open the app and start logging issues. We have about 30 different types of issues, so it is really diverse. You can log anything anywhere in the country,” he says.
The impact is already visible. “Take this pothole here in Melville,” Keyuren says. “It has been here for months and every morning it causes chaos. With the app, residents can log the issue and it gets tracked. That is the power of reporting combined with follow-up.”
City Menders now has a WhatsApp service that Keyuren calls a “service delivery butler.” “It follows up with you, checks if the issues are being fixed, sees if the municipality has responded, and gives you reference numbers. It makes reporting and tracking simple and effective,” he explains.
The app has grown beyond reporting. “We are building the South African National Infrastructure Centre, a digital hub that can track every single issue across the country. This is going to be really impactful for community organisations, councillors, and eventually municipalities,” Keyuren adds.
Apps like Fix Local have tried to solve similar problems. Mark Heywood, co-creator of Fix Local, says, “Our aim is to make it easier for citizens to report local service delivery problems. Many people do report problems and nothing happens, so we help escalate issues by connecting users with their local councillors.”
For Keyuren, the goal is simple. “We want citizens to be able to log service delivery problems without barriers. They should not have to fight alone for basic services. We are giving people the tools to make issues visible and trackable.”
City Menders shows that frustration can become innovation. Technology can empower ordinary people to demand accountability. Now the challenge is for those in power to respond.
