Residents and businesses in East Lynne, Pretoria, are still recovering following a three-week power outage over the festive season.
Eastway Spares’ David Eichhorn said the company was without power for eight days in December.
Businesses forced to rely on generators
“It was very difficult, especially running a business. Fortunately, we have a generator, but a generator costs money to run. It costs us between R800 and R1 000 a day just for fuel.
“Some people didn’t have power up to three weeks,” he said.
Eichhorn added they had no choice but to run the generator.
“Other businesses in the area had it worse. The KFC next door doesn’t operate when there is a power outage; they don’t have any backup. When the power is off, nothing works, so they close their doors,” he added.
Eichhorn said it felt as if East Lynne was a forgotten suburb.
“Look at the grass and look at the litter, besides the electricity, the whole area is neglected,” he added.
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Pensioners feel financial strain
East Lynne resident Shirley Becker said while she had inverters and a generator, the power outages still hit them hard.
“We had to buy about R4 000 of petrol to run the generator during the power outages; we are pensioners, we didn’t budget for this,” she explained.
Becker’s power went off on 26 December and remained off for 12 days before it was restored.
She said during the outages, she had to throw away food which went off that she bought in bulk for December. “The power has been on and off since,” she added.
Becker said there was a massive power overload in the area where houses were being converted into communes and extra rooms were being built in back yards.
“We have been reporting it for years, but nothing comes of it,” she said.
DA criticises infrastructure response
DA Tshwane mayoral candidate Cilliers Brink said since he was voted in as a councillor in 2011, he had never seen a power outage last more than three weeks.
Brink said when the power outage hit the area, it was almost like nobody cared. “We had Wapadrand, which was off two weeks at a time, and Mooikloof was off for a week and a half.
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“When those pylons collapsed over the highway, it took us days; we really put in an effort to fix it. If you add this together, it was almost a month together without electricity,” he added.
Brink said the city could have made the decision to replace the infeed cable running from Koedoespoort down to East Lynne, but instead tried to patch the cable, which prolonged the outage.
“In the first week of the outage, it was clear that the cable was busted. A call should have been made to replace the cable but, instead, they tried to fix it,” he said.
Brink added that not only did the city not want to spend money to fix people’s power in East Lynne, it also highlighted the state of infrastructure in the city.
City cites substation upgrade project
City of Tshwane MMC for utility services Frans Boshielo said the city continues to make steady progress in strengthening its electricity network via the refurbishment and expansion of the Monavoni 132/11kV substation.
He said it was a key project in the city’s energy stabilisation plan.
“This critical infrastructure development is designed to enhance power supply capacity and reliability in Monavoni and surrounding areas.”
The project is about 75% complete, with several key components nearing finalisation.
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