Cape Town - After receiving multiple reports from residents, regarding electricity outages for up to five months at a time in Delft and Bishop Lavis, community leaders and Eskom officials gathered to address the issue.
Councillor and sub-council chairperson Angus Mckenzie said they received various complaints over the last few months, of electricity queries not being followed up or resolved from Eskom supply areas and, in one such case, they had a situation where a resident – dependent on oxygen – was without electricity for up to two weeks.
Delft resident Jacqueline Poole said she’s been without electricity for two months now.
“I have phoned, I have put in many complaints, and only received a reference number on Wednesday. It’s unfair because I have my mother, my grandmother and my children with me. Every night, when I get home, I have to think about whose house I can cook in, it’s not right,” said Poole.
Business owner and Delft resident Charles George runs a WiFi project in the area, and said they have been severely affected by the power outages.
“When we have these outages, we have clients that are not connected, which then snowballs into other ecosystems – like community safety – where people cannot report crime and we have no control. Their contact numbers and call centre numbers don't work, so we are very negatively impacted,” said George.
Eskom spokesperson Kyle Cookson said: “The network is under severe constraint due to cable theft, vandalism of equipment and illegal connections, and where the safety of field staff is compromised in these high risk areas. These are factors which have drastically impacted the electricity restoration time to customers.”
Cookson said the rise in electricity-related crimes and the constant security risk faced by technicians impacted Eskom’s ability to effectively attend to normal customer faults.
“We have now put measures in place to assist Eskom. These include a dedicated communications platform for councillors and Eskom officials to directly address serious concerns, such as extended outages, as well as assistance of community-based safety officials needing to respond to jobs in volatile areas,” said Mckenzie.