In my country, a couple of years some neighbors got together and fixed a pothole on their street. They ended up getting fined by the local authorities for damaging public property.....
Honestly I wouldn't care so long as they do it right. Around here you're lucky if PennDOT drives over the asphalt with their truck once after the haphazardly tossed it in the hole still full of rain water. And they wonder why they have fixed the same pot hole in front of our drive way every spring for the 5 years we have lived here.
As a fellow Pennsylvanian, I can agree that even on my 10 minute commute, potholes are awfully prevalent. I think I drive over one that has been filled every year in the 6 years I've been in my area.
The reason your roads have so many potholes is because where you live likely has too much road infrastructure to support relative to the amount of taxes collected to maintain said infrastructure.
It's corruption not lack of money that's the cause of the piss poor infrastructure in Johannesburg. Out of the three cities I've been to in SA it's the only one that straight up doesn't maintain anything.