The rails we lost: How South Africa squandered its continental mandate for rolling stock

IN 2015, the African Union (AU) assigned South Africa the continental mandate to lead the manufacturing of rolling stock for Africa. The decision recognised South Africa's industrial base, engineering expertise and infrastructure as the continent's most advanced. It was an opportunity to anchor regional industrialisation, create skilled employment and supply trains, coaches and components to a growing African market.

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As Professor Pali Lehohla observed, “The 2015 AU Summit granted South Africa rights to rolling stock, but ten years later nothing happened, except that we ripped our rail apart, disgustingly throwing confidence in our ability to supply rolling stock to the continent completely out of the window, along with any hope for steel manufacturing.”

Ten years later, that assessment stands uncomfortably close to the truth. South Africa has neither built a sustainable rolling-stock industry nor maintained a reliable domestic rail system. The failure to implement the AU's mandate reflects a broader pattern of policy inertia and institutional decline that continues to undermine competitiveness and credibility.

Between 2017 and 2025, Transnet Freight Rail's performance reveals the scale of regression. In 2017/18, TFR moved about 226 million tonnes of freight. By 2023/24, volumes had fallen to 151.7 million tonnes and projections for 2024/25 stand between 160 million and 165 million tonnes, well below the 170 million-tonne target. This contraction illustrates not only operational underperformance but also the erosion of industrial capacity and export reliability.

Passenger rail has suffered equally. Prasa's modernisation programme, designed to deliver over 600 train sets, has produced fewer than 120 usable units since 2015. Many have been vandalised or remain idle because of power failures and infrastructure decay. The Gibela plant in Nigel, established to revive local manufacturing, operates far below its design output. Localisation targets of 65 % content were announced without matching investment in supplier readiness, testing, or certification.

Transnet Engineering retains technical competence, but utilisation of its factories fluctuates between 40 % and 60 %, a direct result of irregular procurement and inconsistent funding. Workshops that once exported locomotives and wagons now depend on maintenance contracts to survive.