Some areas that are serviced by the West Acres Substation continue to go without electricity more than 80 hours after it had temporarily been decommissioned for essential renovations to be done within the initially projected timeframe of 20 hours.

Thea Rix, a councillor in the City of Mbombela (CoM), confirmed that although most areas had had their electricity restored, others were still facing challenges. “We are aware of the power failure affecting certain areas, including a property in Alibama Street where a cable fault was located. Arrangements to have this property opened up have been made,” said Rix.

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She said Geelhout, Chestnut and surrounding areas have low voltage, and attributed this to suspected cable theft. Rix added that N’tulo also experienced power failure, but that an electrician had been dispatched to investigate. “We can now confirm that N’tulo and Geelhout are now on,” said Rix.

The operation to replace some old electric panels in the substation and do some maintenance started at 09:00 on Tuesday, January 7, and had originally been scheduled to be completed by 17:00 the following day. However, the operation spilled well over to the early hours of Wednesday, January 8.

The CoM’s spokesperson, Joseph Ngala, reported that by 03:30 on Wednesday morning, at least 90% of the electricity had been restored to various areas.