Following a peaceful protest near Roosevelt substation on 8 January which saw City of Johannesburg Mayor Herman Mashaba being summoned by angry residents to address current power outages, a change has been brought to the ongoing crisis.
Ward 88 councillor Nicholas Lorimer, who has been a source of information to many outraged residents, confirmed on 9 January that some areas had been restored while others lasted until midnight.
“Blackheath, Berario and Northcliff Ext 12 lost power again due to a distributor trip last night around 12pm. The City Power team has been working to restore it,” Lorimer said.
In finding a solution, a lot of suggestions were raised by concerned residents, including a plea to the City to install emergency generators as city engineers work on the problem. However, the plea was rejected by the City, citing that they do not have generators which could replace an entire substation.
City Power engineer Sipho Gamede explained, “We do not have those kind of generators whereby we can install it at the sub to replace the sub. There is no such generator in the country and as well as the world.”
Gamede added that bringing in generators to supply electricity would lead to further delays in the restoration process.
“We can bring generators into the areas, but the time we connect the last generator, the problem would have been resolved. And when we start disconnecting them, more customers will suffer.”
