Kloofsig power outages continue to frustrate residents
In hopes to come up with a solution and receive answers, members of the community held a meeting with ward councillors and electricians last week.
Residents of Kloofsig are becoming increasingly frustrated with frequent power outages in the area.
In the hopes of coming up with a solution, community members held a meeting with ward councillors and electricians last week.
The constant power outages have put a strain on residents’ finances and local businesses.
The Kloofsig power station burnt down in December last year and power has to be sourced from two other substations.
Faulty cables that frequently fail have also exacerbated the situation.
Resident Beren Bauermeister said their power was off for two-and-a-half hours last week Tuesday, allegedly caused by a contractor who had an incident with a cable in Clifton Road.
“All the talk we get from our councillors and politicians are just empty promises,” she said.
Electricians present at the meeting assured residents that new cables were functional and that the two power stations were providing a sufficient supply of power and can handle the extra load.
Frequent vandalism and stealing of mini-subs have increasingly become an issue.
The community agreed that they need to work together with their local CPF to deal with this problem.
It can take between 12 and 16 hours for electricians to fix or replace a mini-sub and it costs R400 000.
Ward councillor David Farquharson said a council meeting will be held on July 21 to discuss the various power problems in the Gauteng area.
Residents asked that the council keep them more up-to-date when big decisions are being made, especially in regards to electricity.
“It is a problem that we as ward councillors don’t always know what’s going on within each ward,” Farquharson said.
“We don’t normally know of each power outage, or theft happening in each ward.
Farquharson said streetlights are also a big issue.
“At the moment we are looking to get some clarity from the regional level.
“But the one benefit we’ve had is teams going around, checking which lights are working and which aren’t. We have been able to come up with a list that we will be concentrating on.
“In this ward alone we have about 50 lights that aren’t working, but we keep on working on it and push for solutions,” said Farquharson.
Residents were not satisfied with the answers they were given, and want someone advocating for them at the council.
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