Power problems dominates Moot community meeting
“We feel there is no urgency of getting help in time. We log calls but we only get helped after a long time. It is unacceptable.”
About 150 residents from the Moot attended a meeting held at Nellie Swart primary school on Tuesday, January 10 to convey their dissatisfaction with the poor state of infrastructure and area management.
The meeting lasted for two hours – most of it was in the dark due to load-shedding.
MMCs Daryl Johnston (Utilities), Kingsley Wakeland (Corporate and Shared Services), Dikeledi Shelowa (Roads and Transport), Phuti Moloto, Andre Jacobs (representing Grandi Theunissen, MMC of Community Safety), and representatives from the TMPD attended.
The main concern raised by residents was the area’s electricity supply, including extended waiting times for the electricity to be restored after load-shedding, failing or non-functional streetlights, sub-station breakdowns and maintenance and slow turnover times for reported power outages.
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Other concerns included:
– the unauthorised taxi rank at the Hardy Muller circle,
– uncut grass and overgrown areas,
– speedbumps that were approved but never implemented,
– unsightly and unmaintained infrastructure such as the Kilner Park shopping centre,
– building by-law violations
Residents complained they felt like they had to take matters into their own hands.
A resident from Queenswood, Lifa Maphanga, said a problem in their area was “when the electricity comes back after load-shedding, it trips for many hours”.
“Maybe in a month, we can count almost five to 10 times.
“We feel there is no urgency of getting help in time. We log calls but we only get help after a long time.
“It is unacceptable.”
Heleen Gibson told officials that the erratic power cuts were threatening her husband’s life as he suffered from end-stage renal failure. Robert Gibson has to use a dialysis machine for 11 hours every night.
Heleen said that while load-shedding already caused a great amount of stress, instances, where the community had to wait 18 hours or more for outages to be addressed, have impacted their family heavily.
Robert Gibson said: “The schedule of load-shedding, with power trips thereafter, due to ageing infrastructure, cannot describe the level of anxiety and stress and the enormous impact on our budget. Being pensioners, this unwarranted expense of R580 every second day to purchase petrol is eroding our budget.
“I could die within three days without effective dialysis to remove toxins.”
Johnston explained how load-shedding schedules were decided, and that load-shedding caused most of the issues that residents were experiencing as the switching on and off of power-damaged infrastructure at substations.
“Predictable power outages allow thieves to steal cables.”
Johnston said his office planned to address these problems by setting up an energy task team to look at alternative power supply options to move away from Eskom.
“However, this is not an immediate solution.
“We are looking at the potential of Rooiwaal power station,” he said.
The lack of grass-cutting and maintenance of open areas, such as the riverside in Colbyn, leads to criminality and other safety concerns.
Residents complained that they had to maintain public areas themselves and resented the fact that it was costing them on top of rates and taxes to keep the area safe and clean.
One Kilner Park resident said that she was embarrassed about where she lived as vagrants were using unmaintained open spaces across from her home and that she was concerned about the safety of her family.
Residents complained of the lack of visibility of TMPD, saying that they were not enforcing laws.
Hardy Muller circle was becoming an unauthorised taxi rank with taxis breaking the law with no consequences.
A resident raised the point that they had successfully petitioned for speed humps outside a local school in Muller Street at the end of 2020 and that it has been approved.
They were, however, told that there was no budget for the installation. To date, residents said that they had not received any feedback or any action taken.
Due to time constraints, MMC for Roads and Transport Dikeledi Shelowa was not able to answer all the questions, but said that she would report back to the list of questions in the coming week.
Mayor Randall Williams in a tweet thanked Moot residents for the “productive engagement”.
“Recurring power outages as a result of load-shedding are one of the biggest challenges we are facing in the city.”
I would like to thank our residents in Moot for the productive engagements we held with them last night. Recurring power outages as a result of loadshedding are one of the biggest challenges we are facing in the City. #Stage6 pic.twitter.com/7HjDP3OARJ
— Mayor Randall Williams (@tshwane_mayor) January 11, 2023
A follow-up meeting between city officials and resident association representatives will be organised to communicate the plans and timelines for the issues raised by the residents.
The spokesperson for the Moot constituency meeting, Sonja Nagel, said, “It’s a great feeling to see how many people care about our community and how many are fed up with the current situation. This shows the length the community will go to make things better in the community”.
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