Region 3 residents reeling from prolonged power outages
The metro says that Region 3 was the hardest hit by the recent storm.

Region 3 residents, particularly in the west of Pretoria, are fed up with the metro’s inability to address power outages quickly.
Residents in Proclamation Hill recently experienced a blackout that lasted nearly three days due to cable theft.
Locals felt that the metro does not take them seriously enough and service delivery is a fantasy.
“It does not help to complain about service delivery because we have no service delivery,” said resident Wendy Oelofse.
“If the substation on Mimosa Avenue had been locked, that incident would not have occurred. That person could have still been alive and residents would have had electricity.”
Oelofse was referring to an incident in the second week of February when a suspected cable thief was electrocuted and the resulting blackout lasted more than four days.
“Residents of West Park and Proclamation Hill have been without power for weeks now because of cable theft. Where is the money that we taxpayers are paying?”
A Proclamation Hill family had to take its seven-month-old infant to Steve Biko hospital because the home ventilator it used did not work because of the outage.
“We have a baby that has lung problems and because of the power it becomes difficult to use the machine. When we called Tshwane during that week, it said everybody was in a meeting and then four hours later, it said it was waiting for the repairmen to come out,” said the child’s mother, Delia Carlsen.
“But we have to vote, yet our voice is not heard. How much longer are Tshwane residents going to sit without power? And it just sits or does nothing and tell us that there is no material to solve the problem but we as people still have to struggle without power.”
Carlsen, like many other Proclamation Hill residents, believes that they have been forgotten.
“The ward is very angry because the metro is useless. I had to take my meat to my son’s deep freeze and salvage what we had left. We waited and waited and there were stories and stories,” said fellow resident, Sonja Theron.
Rekord approached the metro regarding the complaints. The metro said the recent storm was to blame.
The metro acknowledged that Region 3 was the hardest hit and assured residents that technicians were hard at work to restore power to all areas.
“A transmission team has been deployed to Region 3 – which is the worst affected region,” the metro said in a statement.
The storm uprooted trees that ripped power lines leaving parts of Tshwane in prolonged blackouts.
“Region 3 technicians have been overstretched due to the size of the network that they cover, and the number of outages experienced over the past few days, resulting in a massive restoration backlog,” the statement continued.
The metro said electricians are showing signs of “buckling under the strain” and another team had to be hastily assembled to address the block.
“The city is committed to accelerating power restoration to frustrated customers and appeals for patience from our residents while we strive to reduce the backlog. Tshwane apologises for the inconvenience caused,” the statement concluded.
Ward 1 councillor, Leon Kruyshaar also expressed frustration over the challenges his ward had to face after the storm.
“We had more than 3 000 complaints. Many trees were uprooted, and several poles toppled over because of the high winds. Tshwane is trying to play catch up. We have difficulties with cherry pickers and stock… mostly due to theft. We have huge challenges when it comes to law enforcement in my ward. Our meter boxes are broken open and stripped daily,” Kruyshaar said.
Kruyshaar said that the power box in the Daspoort tunnel has been vandalised almost every night, despite the best efforts to secure it, leaving it without lights.
He blames drug addicts for a lot of the electricity woes in the area.
“The moment we have load-shedding, it’s an indicator to the vagrants to steal us blind for their next fix. We need the provincial and national governments to assist us. Also, we have way too many undocumented foreigners in my ward. While Tshwane is trying its best to catch up, more theft is taking place, especially when overhead lines are stolen,” he said.
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