Power outages in Rustivia industrial area left businesses in limbo for three days.
The CoE reported that the cables supplying the area were damaged by a third party.
Business operators in Rustivia Industrial Village affected by this outage spoke to this paper to share their grievances.
Ward 92 Clr Kade Guerreiro also reported that the power problems affected several industrial areas including parts of Meadowdale.
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According to Quanton Coetzer from African Trading, the power went off on Monday at 06:00.
He argued that most business owners were not happy about the situation because they needed to submit their financial records as this is considered the busiest week of the month.
“It disrupts our operations at a time when we all trying to increase our turnover sales. We were unable to use our printing machines, and we are operating at 60% capacity,” said Coetzer.
Theo Matleng, building manager, said he was alerted by security on Monday morning that there was no power.
“The village boasts of companies that cannot survive days without power. A company that is printing t-shirts could not push their orders. They had to outsource from another service provider, which means they are losing production and money.
“There are 24 tenants without power and each one has their difficulties when there is no power. When it’s load-shedding we understand it will return soon.
“A signage company was working on a 50% capacity using a generator. They had a vehicle waiting to be branded but work was not done. They also could not use their big machine for production,” said Matleng.
Kathryn Gericke from Vistaden Trading said they distribute goods to Takealot and production was delayed by the outage.
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“While our generator has been running all day, we have not been able to operate at full capacity. It requires maintenance and is costly to operate. Even with a generator, some equipment isn’t operating, and the building isn’t connected,” said Gericke.
“The cleaning staff is unable to do their jobs. A few of our employees have diabetes, therefore they must keep their insulin refrigerated and our fridges are not functional,” said Gericke.According to Guerreiro, technicians handled the problem.
“Only the Rustivia area needed its power restored after it had been restored in other places. The primary substation that supplies the industrial sites underwent repairs,” said Guerreiro.
GCN sent a request for comment to the city of Ekurhuleni media team questioning when power will be restored and what had caused the faults.
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City spokesperson Zweli Dlamini said on February 28, the power was fully restored despite damage caused by a third party.
“The delay was as a result of difficulty in accessing the cable servitude for repairs,” said Dlamini.
