It was a tough call, but Hill-Lewis is a regional politician who clearly enjoys wide support among readers, whereas advocate Andrea Johnson, the head of the Investigating Directorate – who pipped the dynamic mayor in the person of the year category –  is a national figure.

DM person of the year runner-up Hill-Lewis had barely moved into his new fifth-floor office in the Civic Centre after being inaugurated in November 2021 when a massive blaze incinerated Parliament on 2 January.

The mayor and DA Western Cape Premier Alan Winde made the newly renovated City Hall available to serve as Parliament after the fire.

Although it is still the early days of wearing the mayoral chain, Hill-Lewis has been one of the most hard-working and visible mayors the city has seen. So much so that veteran activist Zackie Achmat praised Hill-Lewis, saying his style “signalled a change in the approach of his administration to working-class communities”.

The City, under Hill-Lewis’s leadership, has focused on sewerage repairs and upgrades, and he has driven a bid that secured $4.5-million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation towards a pilot project.

Visit Daily Maverick’s home page for more news, analysis and investigations

Key focus areas have been homelessness, finding ways to mitigate rolling blackouts for residents and opening paths to renewables. A solar plant has been promised by 2023.

In the latest  2020-21 Municipal Finance Management Act report, the Western Cape Metro was commended for the “quality of its financial statements and performance report that were free from material misstatements”. However, this financially unqualified opinion was a “regression” from the previous year’s clean audit.

Cape Town has seen growth and investment, and the province has seen major investments pouring in from Europe in particular.

The City has opened up paths to renewables and announced that it will build a solar plant by 2023. Also, it is due to pay independent energy producers to feed power into the grid.

DM168

How we chose the People of the Year winners

How did the 35-year-old Geordin Hill-Lewis end up as No 2 and not No 1 in the Person of the Year category? The editors explain.

In the past, Daily Maverick journalists decided who they thought warranted the title of Person of the Year, but recently we have asked readers to vote for their preferred choice, with the proviso that we still have the final say.

Choosing the annual winners is a labour of love because that’s what it takes to get a bunch of DM editors to decide whether they agree or disagree with the choices of 13,000 readers.

The DM team ultimately chose Andrea Johnson, the head of the NPA’s Investigating Directorate, as the South African Person of the Year. The person for whom the readers voted as Person of the Year, Hill-Lewis, definitely made a local impact, but we were looking for a national figure.

The DM editors also chose Katlego Maphai, co-founder and CEO of Yoco Technologies, as Businessperson of the Year, while readers voted for FlySafair’s Elmar Conradie.

We decided on three very deserving candidates for Community Champion of the Year: Dr Tim De Maayer (the readers’ choice), police officer Busisiwe Mjwara, who sacrificed her life saving KwaZulu-Natal flood victims, and Corene Conradie from Gift of the Givers. – Heather Robertson, DM168 editor

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R25.