Residents of numerous streets around Letaba Street in Carletonville have been without electricity since early last Wednesday, 20 April. The cause was the vandalism of the Letaba Street substation.
“We are so frustrated. All the meat in our freezers went off and there is nothing we can do.
“The municipality just does not care,” one resident from this street complained.
Another resident around the corner in the affected part of Kaolin Street had to fork out about R4,000 to keep his generator running during the outage.
After dozens of complaints to the municipality and constant calls by the ward councillor, Mr Carlos Rebelo, and other politicians and community leaders, the electricity to the area was eventually restored on Tuesday night.
Meanwhile, residents in other parts of Carletonville, Oberholzer and Welverdiend were also without electricity due to cable theft this week.
Parts of Fochville had problems with the electrical infrastructure. Areas of Khutsong Extension 4 and 5 were also affected at times, besides the usual load shedding due to the residents’ non-payment.
According to feedback, the municipal electricians seemed overwhelmed by all the problems at one stage over the weekend.
On Tuesday, the Herald asked the municipality whether it had con- sidered getting help from outside to get the electricity issues, including maintenance backlogs, under control.
“The municipality will manage on its own,” the municipal spokes- person answered.
