East hit by massive power outage
Municipal workers went on strike last week, demanding a 6.25% salary increase when talks between the South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) and the Tshwane metro collapsed.
Several suburbs of Tshwane have been without electricity for almost two weeks, as striking municipal workers allegedly refused to attend to the outages.
Municipal workers went on strike last week, demanding a 6.25% salary increase when talks between the South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) and the Tshwane metro collapsed.
Some Samwu-affiliated workers have allegedly been intimidating staff members and prohibiting them from reporting for work.
Power outages are nothing new for residents of Pretoria East but this time around, more than 2 000 residents have been affected, going for several days without electricity.
On average, areas such as Zwavelpoort and Olympus experienced power outages at least three times a week.
This time, other areas such as Silver Lakes, Willow Acres, Lynnwood, Garsfontein, Faerie Glen, Equestria, Mooikloof and Moreleta Park were also affected.
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Ward 101 councillor Mike Strange said residents in Willow Acres, Silver Willows 1 & 2, Silver Oaks went without electricity for nearly two weeks.
This was also affecting businesses in the area, such as fast food outlets, supermarkets and car dealerships.
“The power outage hit the area at 16:20 on Saturday, 25 July,” he said.
“The word from the metro is that the protest is hampering service delivery.”
Strange said there were five mini-substations that were affecting a number of homes.
“The reason for the outage is a damaged mini-sub that needs to be replaced because of a cracked bushing. This is the urgent work being done now,” he said.
Strange said the other problem was that only professional system operators could turn the power back on and this could only be done once an assessment has been done to establish what the problem was.
“Skilled electricians can work on medium voltage, but 11 kilovolt networks require specialists,” he said.
“No one else can do this.”
He said switching could not be done while working teams were being intimidated by protesters.
Strange said some teams were able to fix street lights in the areas, but this only created confusion among residents who thought the same team could also restore the electricity.
“The people fixing streetlights are not necessarily experts where electricity outages are concerned.”
Garsfontein resident Dannie Bontso said they have had to throw out some of their food from the fridge
“Some of our food is not even edible,” he said.
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“Will the city pay for the residents’ food? I don’t think so.
“If the interests of the residents are anything to go by, the city must resolve this issue as soon as possible.”
In areas such as Brooklyn, Maroelana residents have gone for three days without electricity.
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