Residents of Soshanguve Ext 8 remain without power after illegal connections hampered restoration efforts following a failure on October 7.

According to a progress report from the Rosslyn Electricity Depot, a low-voltage outage at the K2 substation affected consumers in the area on October 7. The fault was attributed to a missing phase and illegal connections on the affected network.

The depot mentioned that the situation was considered unsafe for teams to work on, preventing repairs.

Unpaid power and safety clearance

The report stated that consumers in the affected area were not purchasing electricity and that the matter had been referred to the metro’s revenue protection unit to facilitate the removal of illegal connections.

No estimated restoration time was available.

Residents struggle with daily disruption

The ongoing outage has affected residents who rely on electricity for basic household activities, including cooking, lighting, charging phones and keeping food refrigerated.

Resident Dimpho Maleka said the continued outage has disrupted their daily routines and made it difficult to carry out normal household activities.

“We are struggling because we depend on electricity for almost everything at home,” said Maleka. “It affects cooking, charging our phones, and even keeping the house safe at night.

“We understand that illegal connections are dangerous, but residents who are using the legal network are also suffering.”

Progress in other extensions

Power was restored in Soshanguve Ext 4 following an outage caused by an unknown fault, while another outage affecting properties in Soshanguve Ext 1 was resolved after stolen neutral busbars were replaced.

Do you have more information about the story?

Please send us an email to bennittb@rekord.co.za or phone us on 083 625 4114.

For free breaking and community news, visit Rekord’s websites: Rekord East

For more news and interesting articles, like Rekord on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Instagram or TikTok or WhatsApp Channel