A family from the west of Pretoria has been without power for more than a month following an accusation from the Tshwane metro that they are illegally connected.
However, the Smith family claim that they have made no illegal connection and are innocent.
“We do not know what to do anymore,” said Shaun, the man of the house in Pretoria Street, Claremont.
“We are very despondent and cannot go on without power.”
He said what frustrated them more was that they were receiving no assistance from the metro.
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“We do not know where we stand anymore,” he said.
“I just wish that someone out there could help.”
On 23 April, Shaun arrived home to find a disconnection notification in their post box.
“But when my husband entered our home, he noticed that our power was not disconnected,” his wife, Mariandel, said.
“He went out immediately and took photos of the electricity pole that showed there was no disconnection.”
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On 6 May, Mariandel said she returned home from work to find that their main power cable had been cut off.
“I got a notification in the post box which basically accused us of tampering with the electricity supply,” she said.
“We did not tamper with the electricity because it was never switched off.”
She then started contacting the metro to try to find out to who to speak to.
“Nobody was able to help us,” she said.
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She said from there on forward it had been a process of regular email follow-up with the metro, but to no avail.
In the meantime, Shaun said they had stopped paying their account.
“We will not pay our municipal account if our power was switched off without it being our fault,” he said.
Tshwane metro spokesperson Lindela Mashigo told Rekord that the metro was aware of the issue.
He said they had forwarded the complaint to the relevant department, adding that it was under investigation.
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