Erratic power supply persists in Menlo Park and surrounds despite petition to Tshwane

Despite petitioning Tshwane in early February with a view to end persistent power outages, ratepayers in Menlo Park, Maroelana, Ashlea Gardens, Lynnwood, Alphen Park and Hazelwood have this week again endured erratic power supply.

According to the residents, their pleas for reliable electricity supply have, once again, gone unheeded by the Tshwane Metro.

To date over 690 residents have signed the petition.

Ward 82 councillor Siobhan Muller said this is a recurring problem, and it’s the sixth time so far this year that this area has been plunged into darkness for a prolonged period.

Muller said in the last four weeks, these suburbs experienced prolonged outages four times.

“We have handed a petition to council asking them to deal with these issues, and to deal wth the root cause, not just temporary repairs.”

She said the city has not been forthcoming in revealing what was the true cause of these outages.

“There’s no indication of what the problem was, and they say everybody has power, while its not true.”

Muller claimed that when a resident logs a service delivery complaint, for either a power outage or water leak, they suddenly get a notice, as well as a reference number claiming the problem has been resolved, while in actual fact nothing has been done.

She said despite having petitioned the city to address recurrent power outages as early as February, residents continue to grapple with erratic electrical service and have left them frustrated.

The suburbs are sometimes intermittently without electricity not attributable to load-shedding.

These outages in past years have led to residents and businesses moving out of these suburbs.

In February residents in those affected suburbs told Rekord they do not believe all of these outages can be attributed to cable theft.

Muller called on the metro to establish the root cause of these outages.

On Wednesday March 5, Mayor Dr Nasiphi Moya said the metro is taking action to address power outages across multiple regions.

Moya said Tshwane is actively responding to ongoing power outages affecting several areas, including Ashlea Gardens.

Moya said over the next 12 hours, efforts would be intensified to restore supply as swiftly as possible.

“These outages have been largely caused by cable faults, exacerbated by recent heavy rainfall, resulting in widespread infrastructure failures.”

She added that the failures have also led to block and single outages, which are being addressed.

“Our teams have been working tirelessly to restore power, and additional repair teams have been deployed to affected areas to speed up the restoration process. These teams will continue working overnight, particularly as more rain is expected, to restore supply wherever possible.”

Moya said, “We are pleased to report that progress has been made, with power successfully restored in areas such as Menlo Park.

“However, we fully acknowledge that many residents and businesses remain without electricity, and we remain committed to resolving these outages as quickly as possible.

“We appreciate the patience and understanding of our residents and businesses during this challenging time.

“While immediate restoration remains our top priority, we are also focusing on long-term solutions to enhance the resilience and reliability of the city’s power infrastructure and prevent future disruptions.”

These measures include:

– Taking decisive action against cable theft and illegal connections, which place additional strain on the city’s infrastructure.

– Ongoing maintenance and upgrades to strengthen network stability and resilience.

– Enhancing response capacity to address faults more efficiently.

– Investing in sustainable energy solutions to build a more stable and reliable power supply.

Moya said the city would continue to provide regular updates as work progresses and urged residents to report any ongoing faults through the official customer service channels.

The petition has now garnered over 690 signatures, in it residents demanded the following from Tshwane:

– Take immediate action on behalf of all rate and tax paying residents.

– Investigate the current lack of electrical services and to resolve such a lack, in order to ensure that same meets their essential needs and rights.

– Investigate and eliminate any further unforeseen, continuous and/or re-occurring power outages or “trips”.

– Act in a transparent, accountable and equitable manner in that regard when investigating the causes of such unforeseen, continuous and/or re-occurring power outages.

– Investigate why calls are closed without repairs being completed.

Do you have more information about the story?

Please send us an email to bennittb@rekord.co.za or phone us on 083 625 4114.

For free breaking and community news, visit Rekord’s websites: Rekord East

For more news and interesting articles, like Rekord on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Instagram or TikTok.