As residents of the town woke up on the morning of Thursday, 3 February, they realised that no one in the town had electricity. As Eskom load shedding was supposed to start at 10:00, the residents hoped the problem would be sorted out by then. Merafong City Local Municipality’s electricians were indeed spotted working at the main sub- station in 1ste Avenue. “Please be patient,” was the only feedback from the ward councillor, Mr Thabo Mokuke. It was only after 18:00 that the municipality offered some response. “The Welverdiend main transformer is faulty and cannot be switched on. Repairs will only be done tomorrow morning”. The residents waited in vain, however. It also became clear that thieves, realising that the power was completely off, started stealing cables all over the town. At first, the residents only complained vehemently via social media. The first sign of growing tension was a group of residents that turned up at the substation late Friday afternoon. Although everything was orderly while a local politician, Mr Tollie Lubbe, spoke to the group, people became increasingly frustrated when they still did not have electricity the next day. When the municipality simply did not respond to their pleas for help, a group of residents from all com- munities in the town gathered at the railway bridge and started protesting at 15:00 on Saturday. While some only displayed posters with complaints like “Where is our electricity” or “Merafong, you failed us” others started burning tyres and ended up barricading the main road between Carletonville and Potchefstroom. Some protesters remained in the road. Sporadic protesting occurred the next day again but quietened after the municipality promised to sort the problem out the next day. The electricity stayed off and, on Tuesday, more residents, including those from the Elijah Barayi mega housing complex, started protesting. Their electricity had also gone off at the same time. They burnt tyres and barricaded the main road at the turn-off to Elijah Barayi. According to reports, some even went into Welverdiend’s CBD and tried to loot the shops. Violent protesters also threatened motorists and, according to one report, stole goods from a delivery vehicle. Throughout the blackout, the residents tried to help each other after the food in many people’s fridges had gone off. Some patients in the town could not use their oxygen. The outage continued for so long that it made running generators for household needs almost unaffordable. The municipality eventually responded on Monday and Tuesday, providing technical answers that boiled down to the transformer’s neutral earthing compensator (NEC) being faulty. It first had to be bypassed and then removed. The whole transformer was, indeed, removed for testing and repairs on Wednesday morning, after the municipality said it could not get another one. “We anticipate that the repairs to the transformer will be completed within 24 hours and delivered back to the site by Friday, 11 February 2022. After that, the installation and commissioning will take place,” the municipality said. Residents were not satisfied, however, saying, among other things, the municipality had already known about the problem in December. Many residents vowed to express their dismay at the municipality during the IDP meeting at Laerskool De Beer in Welverdiend, scheduled for 17:00 on Thursday, 10 February. Residents of parts of Khutsong Extensions 5 and 6 were affected by the same problems. Meanwhile, residents of the one half of Tafelberg Street in Carletonville had been stuck without electricity for 11 days by yesterday. People in the areas of Platinum Street and Hoërskool Carletonville also experienced water cuts at times this week.
