Electricity woes continue for Orlando
Residents from Orlando East say Eskom has failed them and stripped them of their rights.
Residents from Orlando East say Eskom has failed them and stripped them of their rights.
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This after 94 houses in the area remained without electricity for over two months. However, this is not a new problem for the community of Ward 30.
Residents said electricity issues began in August last year when they were left in the dark for nearly six months in what they alleged to be political.
The community which has previously embarked on protests closing roads into the community and even marched to Eskom offices said their attempts to engage with the power utility fell on deaf ears and left them to fend for themselves.
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“We decided to take matters into our own hands and contributed monies to outsource our own technicians to fix the transformer which was transported to Germiston and later brought back and started working,” said a resident of Berries, Philani Buthelezi.
But that was a short lived victory as two months later, in April the community was left in the dark yet again in a widespread outage that included four nearby areas who they claim were reconnected after three days, leaving only the community of Berries without power.
“After Eskom technicians restored power in surrounding areas, they came here the same day, and went to the transformer box with the councillor who got the keys from one of our street leaders.
“They said they were here to isolate the box as they claimed that our box was the cause of the blackout because it was faulty. When they were done, 94 houses were left without electricity,” Buthelezi further explained.
Another resident, Zodwa Nkwanyana, who resides at her late grandmother’s house said, “Our children use cold water, elderly persons who depend on oxygen tanks and those on diabetis injections have been heavily affected. Even crime has increased.”
According to residents that spoke to Soweto Urban, Eskom and the councillor reached an agreement of defeat payments requesting residents pay R500 for 12 months of which 80% of households should have paid for the power utility to restore their electricity.
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“To us it’s a challenge because some people are unemployed, we also have pensioners and child headed homes. So we are finding it difficult to know how this will be done when they expect 80% of the houses to pay before they can help us,” the residents said.
Ward 30 councillor, Mohau Molefe, disputed this saying members of the community were part of the delegation which engaged with Eskom and agreed to Eskom’s resolution of defeat payments saying they would start paying at the end of May.
Molefe added that the defeat payment arrangement was reached after he told the power utility the community could not afford to pay R6000 cash.
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“I requested Eskom to make defeat payment arrangement because we don’t have that kind of money but we are willing to get a new mini sub,” he said.
Molefe further explained saying, “Eskom stated when all residents pay, they would order the mini sub and install it soon after but the pre-condition is that all affected people especially those who don’t buy electricity or have defaulted, should pay R500 as a minimum contribution and will continuously pay for the next 12 months which will sum up to R6000.”
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