Helen Zille has done well to draw attention to the terrible mess created by the African National Congress(ANC) in Johannesburg. By snorkelling, abseiling, fishing, and boating in the craters dotted all over the city, she has made a powerful statement over the mess created by her chief rival in the battle for control of Johannesburg. But she should consider that the strategy needs to shift now from demonstrating the problems to fixing them .

There are deep strategic and data-based reasons for her to consider this.

Regime change requires two things. The first is that the public comes to believe that the old regime no longer protects their interests. That has largely occurred. The second step is that it comes to believe that the new regime will. That step has not been completed – and completing it cracks the code to winning the city.

Polling data on the Johannesburg race, done by the Social Research Foundation (SRF) in conjunction with The Common Sense, reveals the problem.

Whereas two thirds of polled voters like the idea of Zille becoming the mayor, only roughly 40% intend to vote for her. Why? Voting requires the belief that the new regime will fix things.

Some years ago, when the SRF conducted a number of focus groups with Johannesburg voters, the theme that stood out strongly was “show, don’t tell”. Demonstrate how you will fix the city, and we will vote for you.

That may be easier than it seems.

Zille should adopt a scheme that should be built as a visible municipal rescue operation called “Zille Fixes Johannesburg” or similar. It should be centred on a fleet of ten fully branded, multi-purpose bakkies that each performs core tasks, namely pothole repairs, road verge clearing, rubbish removal, and basic road-marking restoration. It would cost about R1 million a month and Johannesburg donors would fall over themselves to help fund it.

Each bakkie should carry a four-person crew made up of one team leader, two general workers, and one semi-skilled road repair worker, with the necessary equipment on board, including cold asphalt or patching material, a compactor or tamper, spades, rakes, brooms, cones, safety signs, brush cutters, rubbish bags, gloves, road-marking paint, stencils, reflective PPE, and a phone or tablet for before-and-after evidence.

The fleet should be run by Zille herself. She should drive the lead vehicle, with the vehicles assigned to especially busy commuter routes, schools, clinics, taxi routes, commercial streets, township entrances, and broken intersections, and each crew should move through its zone fixing what it finds, whether that is a pothole outside a school, rubbish on a pavement, an overgrown verge, or faded stop lines.

An app and website with a daily route map published in the morning will allow the public and the media to follow Zille’s efforts, with before-and-after images posted through the day, and a public scorecard released each evening showing potholes repaired, bags of rubbish removed, verges cleared, road markings restored, and money spent. Residents should be able to report problems through an app. The branding should be simple and unmistakable, such as, “This Pothole Was Fixed by Helen Zille.” The fleet and its efforts would become the centre of Zille’s Johannesburg campaign, broadcasting the message that whereas the old regime cannot advance your interests, the new regime will.

Won’t the ANC stop her? What about the regulations? It would be wonderful if they tried. It would be better yet if the metro police dragged her away in chains. The effect of the campaign would be multiplied 100 times over as citizens see that not only will ANC not fix the city but it will try to stop those who can.