Municipal manager admits that infrastructure in Standerton can’t cope

Residents in Meyerville who have had their fill of the power interruption, resorted to burning tyres on Monday, 24 May.

Cables were stolen and the protest of the locals describes the sheer frustration of having to contend with Eskom’s load shedding and Lekwa’s internal load shedding.

The Standerton Advertiser received a call from a businessman on Wednesday, 26 May, who said no planning could be done due to the uncertainty.

The schedule was only available later the same day.

The DA added their voice to the number of frustrated residents and according to their councillor, Ms Sithi Silosini, Lekwa Municipality’s unpaid debt to Eskom leaves residents double-hit by load shedding.

Ms Silosini issued a press release on 26 May, saying the DA will refer the matter to Parliament for monitoring.

“The consistent in-fighting of the ANC in Lekwa is having a horrific effect on innocent service-deserving residents as there is minimal work being done at the moment due to the dissolution of council,” Ms Silosini added.

According to her, it has been discussed only in the ANC-caucus and corridors with no official statement presented to council.

“The municipality owes Eskom more than R1-billion, which has resulted in Lekwa introducing its own rotational load shedding in addition to national load shedding by the power utility.

“In some areas such as the J-line farms, residents have been without electricity for five weeks to such an extent that the farm owners have resorted to solar panel installations.

“Those who cannot afford solar panel energy, have remained without power.”

She argued that the municipality should ideally be operating on a notified maximum demand (NMD) of 80, but is still stuck with an NMD of 55 that has proved over the past three years, to be insufficient during the freezing winter months.

Ms Silosini described Standerton as one of the worst-run, debt-ridden towns in South Africa.

“The DA condemns any illegal and violent protest that occurred in the past 24 hours.

“However, it can no longer be justified that residents should continue to accept the glaring incompetency, lack of transparency, nepotism, and corruption of the ANC-led municipality.

“The right to acceptable standards of service delivery in terms of water, sewage, and electricity is entrenched in the Constitution, and by implication, a right every citizen is entitled to.”

The municipal manager, Ms Gugulethu Mhlongo-Ntshangase, also issued a statement the past week, saying the municipality is having challenges with its capacity to deliver adequate electricity supply to meet the peak demand, especially in winter.

Ms Mhlongo-Ntshangase cited the licensed Notified Maximum Demand (NMD) of 55 MVA and said it has peaked at a 67.5 MVA in the past and once the 55 MVA is exceeded, the main electricity supply trips.

She also said cable theft, vandalising of electrical equipment and burning of equipment take place during interruptions.

“The current situation is getting out of hand and is posing a potential danger to our communities and loss of power supply to the community as the stolen and vandalised equipment and cables take time to replace.”

She admitted that the municipality’s infrastructure is currently not coping. Internal load shedding was given attention and the schedule may be implemented as and when needed, following load monitoring.

According to her, the load reduction programme is to help the community, not to punish them unnecessarily.

The schedule is adjusted according to demand.

The times on the new proposed schedule was changed from last year’s schedule as to fall within Eskom time-frames, to prevent three hour outages, in the event of Eskom load shedding periods.

The Standerton Advertiser contacted the communications manager of Lekwa, Ms Thobeka Mtshiselwa, on Friday, 28 May, asking whether Lekwa has officially been handed over to an administrator.

Ms Mthiselwa replied the same day that Lekwa is officially under administration. “Processes are still unfolding and the administrator has not been announced yet.”