Businesses, councillor, residents fix streetlights in Silverton

Local businesses, AfriForum and residents recently repaired vandalised and malfunctioning streetlights in Silverton and Meyerspark, east of Pretoria.

This is after residents complained that dysfunctional streetlights have resulted in increased crime.

Several streetlights had defects, some had their straightening rod knocked down in vehicle collisions, while others were vandalised and cables cut.

Recently, a resident living in Moreleta Street, Riana Swart told Rekord that her street has been without power since November last year and that she has reported this matter countless times.

Ward 41 councillor Ben Chapman said the collaborative efforts came as the ward was almost completely dark.

“Several streets had malfunctioning streetlights while in Meyerspark we couldn’t find any working streetlight.”

Chapman said they approached the city manager to get permission to work on the city infrastructure.

“Through the collaboration and memorandum of understanding between AfriForum, the city granted us permission to embark on the repairs.”

Chapman said he found two qualified electricians, who are former city employees, were vetted by the city to perform the repairs.

According to Chapman, the repair project funding came from residents, AfriForum and local businesses.

“Residents made contributions to see their areas well-lit, and bulk funding was from businesses within the Silverton area.

“With the funds, we hired a cherry-picker, bought materials and called in the electricians.”

Chapman said the repair work began in La Montagne, where 60-70% of streetlights were repaired

He said the second destination was Meyerspark, where a huge cable was stolen.

“We then moved to Silverton extensions and south of Pretoria Road, all the streetlights were repaired.

“We will move to Silverton town in the next two weeks to fix all the remaining lights,” he added.

Chapman said over 100 streetlights have been repaired and switched on.

“This project is very expensive and all the funds were used for its intended purpose. A lot more needs to be done and we will slowly work on lighting up the entire ward 41.”

He said he understands that the city is under huge financial constraints hence he went into the private sector to seek assistance.

“All this is above board and the contractors invoice the businesses directly. Everyone who wants to do audits and follow the transactions, they are all welcome,” Chapman concluded.

Mayor Cilliers Brink recently acknowledged that poor public lighting endangers communities.

The metro plans to employ a public lighting repair team, he shared.

He added that the metro also planned to install solar lights as a solution to the challenges of broken streetlights.

Brink also referred to a recent partnership with insurance giant, Santam, to repair streetlights in the CBD that was already introduced this month.

Civil rights organisation AfriForum is also ready to tackle the issue of broken streetlights.

De Wet Ungerer, AfriForum co-ordinator for the Greater Pretoria South, said that Pretoria east residents should not be shrouded in darkness due to faulty streetlights.

He explained that the organisation’s Garsfontein and Faerie Glen branch would tackle the problem as soon as possible.

The branch started an audit to determine how many streetlights are faulty in the Garsfontein and Faerie Glen area.

The audit will be presented to the metro to see how it and the organisation together can address these outages in future.

According to Ungerer, the organisation is prepared to help the Faerie Glen and Garsfontein residents if the metro cannot repair the streetlights.

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