Residents in Germiston are at their wits’ end as they are continually without power.
Scores of suburbs were without power once again last week, and when suburbs are turned back on many individual residents and businesses are often then left without power for days.
This unfortunately happened to Prim Villa, situated in Cydonia Road in Primrose Hill.
The home specialises in the care of people with Alzheimer’s and other related dementias and falls under the umbrella of the Methodist Homes for the Aged.
The GCN visited the home in the bitter cold on Wednesday to speak to manager of the home Sharon Flint and Ward 36 councillor Wendy Morgan.
Flint told the GCN that the power had gone off at 3.30am last Monday and by Wednesday morning it had still not been restored.
“My job is to keep the home running efficiently and to make sure the residents are given the best care,” Sharon said.
“The awful thing is I now feel powerless as I cannot keep the residents warm without electricity.”
Although the facility does have a generator, it can only give power to certain sections of the home, and the residents in the frail care section were left in the cold and dark.
However, it had cost the home R6 000 in diesel so far for the generator and last Tuesday the generator stopped working.
Luckily, food could still be cooked and warm drinks made for residents as the home uses gas stoves, but residents could not be bathed or showered as there was no warm water and they could not be kept warm.
“It is so frustrating as they are so vulnerable, and as they suffer from dementia they do not understand what is going on and they are crying because they are cold,” Sharon said.
“They are already confused as they haven’t seen their families due to lockdown and now this.”
Sharon said that the metro did not come out to assist them and in desperation they called out their own private electrician, but he couldn’t do anything as the problem was on council property.
On Wednesday morning, a team from the metro finally arrived after many phone calls, from both Sharon and Wendy, and it was discovered that the underground power cable had burnt.
The power was finally restored at about 2.30pm that afternoon.
“We take responsibility to care for our residents and we have always done a good job, but we felt powerless,” Sharon said.
“It is frustrating that our calls fell on deaf ears and no one helped.”
Wendy said that once again it appears that the metro’s energy department does not seem to care.
“They do not prioritise things and they give no help,” she said.
“No one answers my calls.”
Other residents of Germiston also contacted the GCN to voice their concerns.
Marianna Hutton, a Symhurst resident, told the GCN that they had also suffered power failures again last weekend and last Tuesday and that she knew of three streets in Wychwood, namely Price, Virtot and Mc Alpine roads, where residents had been without power for five days.
“What about the power grid?” Marianna said.
“With all the backyard shacks and illegal buildings the power grid cannot handle the extra amount of power needed and I think we are headed towards an infrastructure collapse.”
A Marlands resident, who did not want to be named, told the GCN that the area had been plagued with power outages, with two even taking place on the same day.
Wendy added that she has been inundated with calls from individuals who have no power even after power has been restored in their neighbourhoods.
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“Two houses in Primrose Hill have not had power since last Sunday and many others are also sitting without power,” she said.
Primrose resident Janet Gerretsen said that from 1am last Friday residents had experienced huge power outages in their areas, with little or no help from the metro.
“Some residents have been without power since then.
“Trying to get hold of anyone at the metro is a joke,” she said.
She added that up to last Tuesday night there had been 123 reported issues of power outages in the Primrose area and surrounds that she knew about, with more coming in all the time.
Ward 92 councillor Graham Gersbach said many areas in his ward had also been plagued by power outages over the last few weeks.
“Many residents in my ward have been affected by the outages, with some going without power for days,” he said.
The GCN contacted the metro for comment regarding the continual power outages in Germiston and how the municipality was going to rectify the problems, but at the time of going to press no comment had been received.
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Contact the newsroom by emailing: Melissa Hart (Editor) germistoncitynews@caxton.co.za, Leigh Hodgson (News Editor) leighh@caxton.co.za or Busi Vilakazi (Journalist) busiv@caxton.co.za.
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