City Power has appealed for patience and cooperation from customers as it grapples to restore power in Johannesburg’s flood-stricken areas.
City Power says it has beefed up resources, but flooded bridges and damaged road surfaces are hampering repair work.
With rainy conditions expected to persist in the coming days, City Power’s resources are under pressure. Hundreds of people have been left in the dark, while some are homeless due to floods.
City Power Spokesperson, Isaac Mangena says technicians’ response time continues to be affected due to flooded roads and trenches especially in Roodepoort, Lenasia, Hursthill and Soweto.
“City Power opened this morning with about 4800 outage calls from customers across the City. Most of the calls come from Roodepoort and Hursthill areas where we had many outages over 24hrs. While we anticipate more challenges with the rain pounding across our service areas, our teams including contractors who have been working hard to address most of the backlogs, are on standby in all the SDCs, ready to respond.”
Mangena has cited rolling blackouts as another contributing factor. He says, rolling blackouts have an adverse impact on infrastructure, costing the Johannesburg electricity company R3.6 million per day.
Eskom is yet to respond. Affected residents are struggling to cope.
“Everything is messed up, I cant even go back into the house. To make matters worse, we do not even have electricity. This is very bad. We have not had electricity for days everything is spoiled in the fridge, we do not even have anything to cook, we now have to rely on take always.”
No time frame to the end of Eskom’s rolling blackouts: Cyril Ramaphosa:
Meanwhile, Human Settlements Minister, Mmamoloko Kubayi says she is going to seek legal advice regarding a property developer who allegedly built homes in an unsuitable area in Soweto – exposing people to the risk of flooding.
“Private developers put people on the flood line literally which shouldn’t have happened. Obviously there’s approval processes by the City. There are storm water drainage system and bridges. You can see in terms of the development. It shouldn’t have been in the manner that it is. We will have to consult legal teams and see how we do it. Obviously those houses need to be relocated and it shouldn’t be at the expense of the state,” says Kubayi.
The extent of the damage is yet to be determined.
Joburg EMS says it will remain on high alert.
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