Public meeting offers no real answers
Ward 74 residents remain frustrated with City Power after a public meeting was held at Puntans-Hill Sports Club, but offered no concrete answers to the issues the ward faces.
Ward 74 councillor and DA caucaus leader Belinda Kayser- Echeozonjoku is worried that there are no ‘real answers’ from City Power, after a public meeting was held at Puntans-Hill Sports Club on May 27 with hopes to address ongoing power outages and electricity frustrations in the ward.
Read more: Ward 74 councillor reflects on a year of resilience and festive hope
General manager of the Inner City Service Delivery Centre (SDC) David McMahon explained that City Power experienced challenges, which included:
• Illegal connections. There are areas which are prone to illegal connections, but the power utility continues to work closely with its protection department to sort this out.
• Load-shedding has a severe impact on the network and the team were identifying high-load circuits which caused tripping after load-shedding ends.
• Theft and vandalism are across the city and each SDC is working with each department to address this.
McMahon added that City Power was working on repairing problematic cables at the Orchards and Gresswold substations, to ensure that the networks worked normally.
Concerns raised by residents during a Q and A dialogue included:
• Constant power outages,
• Dark roads, and increased crimes in the area as a result of this,
• Illegal electricity connections and hijacked buildings,
• Long turn-around times,
• Tickets being closed, even though the power utility did not go to the site to complete the job, and
• Unclear communication from the power utility regarding electricity problems the areas faced.
Also read: Ward 74 community and councillor Belinda Kayser-Echeozonjoku voice alarm over crime hotspots
Explaining the instances of when tickets or calls were usually closed, was Alexandra SDC maintenance manager Hamilton Mathatho. “It’s after a resolution. It can also be during an outage. During an outage, calls from one area get grouped, and when the outage is restored all the calls get closed.” He said that there is also an SMS sent to councillors, notifying them of the restoration of power in certain areas. If any area is still affected, it must be escalated.
Mathatho added that, regarding incomplete jobs, the power utility worked in a way that when a work order was created on the system, and when the staff closed that work order, they closed it as: ‘Temporary repairs done’, which created a follow up work order. “Sometimes technicians are at fault, because they don’t select: ‘Temporary repairs done’, they select: ‘Power restored’, which does not create a follow up work order. We encourage technicians to follow up on work orders thoroughly. We also have quality inspections for bigger jobs, such as underground cable faults. Not houses, because we rely on our customers and residents to alert us to matters relating to their homes.”
Some residents grew frustrated, interrupting officials while they spoke, asking questions, such as: What was the long-term solution to the constant power outages?, which ended up not being answered.
Kayser- Echeozonjoku explained that the longest outage in the ward lasted 12 days. “The 12-day outage was in Hawkins Estate. I had to escalate the matter to the chief operations manager, who eventually sorted it out.”
She added that, although she was disappointed at the turnout, it was important for City Power to be at the meeting. “It’s unfortunate that some residents raised issues, but they’ve now left, instead of bringing those issues to the front. It is also disappointing that we couldn’t get real answers, but the fact that City Power came to explain is very helpful. It eases the burden on councillors, who don’t always have all the answers.”
The councillor noted that she was planning to have more meetings with different entities to deal with the different issues within the ward. “It can’t be that councillors have to bear the brunt of the residents’ frustrations, without the officials being held to account. It’s important that officials account for what is not happening, and what is going wrong for residents and the ward. It’s also important for residents to be able to vent their frustrations.”
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