“I don’t want to die in the dark,” says man
Power outages have destroyed this business and now Eskom is hiking electricity prices beyond most people's capabilities.
MBOMBELA – Belinda Cross-Schoeman runs De la Femme Hair Salon and Le Bronze Tanning Studio from her home in West Acres. Her husband, Robert Cross, has Crohn’s disease and is often in acute pain. His life was saved at Mediclinic Nelspruit four months ago when emergency surgery removed half a metre of his intestine. Unable to keep food in, he suffers from chronic diarrhoea and is anorexically thin.
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Eskom’s power outages are at the core of the couple’s overwhelming difficulties, because Cross-Schoeman’s once thriving tanning business depends entirely on a reliable electricity supply.
“I’ve lost 30% of my tanning clients since the advanced power outage crisis began in early December. The fact that the schedules for power cuts are so random and change so often, makes it impossible for me to juggle the time slots for everybody.
“Now we can’t afford my husband’s medication, especially the stuff that helps with his tummy and his pain. He is too weak to wait all day at Rob Ferreira and we can’t afford private healthcare,” Cross-Schoeman said.
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Her husband said, “I’m still very weak and my legs sometimes give in on the way to the bathroom. A lot of the time, I don’t make it to the toilet on time. It’s really terrible when this is all in the pitch dark, and I promise you, a little torch or a candle doesn’t really help.”
Incredibly, since power outages became a maddening way of life for all of us, most people’s monthly Eskom bills have not come down. This is patently evident when one examines the couple’s bills that have remained constant over the last six months.
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“The City of Mbombela (CoM) regularly threatens to cut our electricity, but how can I pay when the outages have destroyed my business? Now we are told everybody is facing an 18% electricity price hike from Eskom. Who will stop this before we are totally ruined?” Cross-Schoeman asked.
Tears welled up in her husband’s eyes. “I don’t want to die in the dark,” he said.
The CoM was contacted for comment, but by the time of going to press, no reply was forthcoming.
