When an electrical mini substation blew in February, leaving residents of a suburb in Lichtenburg, North West, without power for four days, their embattled local municipality opted for the unconventional by linking their homes with power directly from overhead power lines.
Such is the state of collapse of services in the Ditsobotla local municipality in in the province that municipal electricians were forced to bypass the burnt mini substation supplying electricity to local lines by connecting them directly to transmission lines.
Residents of Shukran, a suburb in Lichtenburg where homes now derive power from lines meant to distribute energy across large distances, said they feared for their lives should anything go wrong during a power surge from the supply.
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Muhammad Jogi told Sowetan their problems with electricity initially started in February when a mini substation supplying their area caught fire. He said since the link up with overhead power lines they had experienced constant power outages.
“Our load-shedding now gets multiplied, it’s been quite a few times where we get prolonged power outages and this has only been happening since we got these illegal connections,” Jogi said.
He said his worst fear was that there could be current surges, which would affect their household electrical appliances.
Ditsobotla mayor Tebogo Buthelezi said the connection was meant to be temporary until the mini substation was fixed.
“I think it’s a question of monitoring because what was meant to be temporary has become permanent,” Buthelezi said.
Buthelezi blamed political instability at the municipality for some of their problems, including the failure to ensure that such connections are eradicated as soon as the mini substation got fixed.
Yusuf Laher, a DA councillor in the Ngaka Modiri Molema district municipality, who also lives in Shukran, said there were more than 20 such illegal connections in the entire municipality.
“Lack of budget (to replace blown up mini substations) is no excuse, we can’t have such illegal connections which have become permanent,” Laher said.
Service delivery has come to a halt in the areas under the municipality, which has been marred by leadership squabbles for power.
Roads have fallen into disrepair both in the town and townships with no signage and faded markings.
Pensioner Emily Tshabadira hired local unemployed youngsters to dig up a furrow in front of her home in Boikhutso to direct sewage water away that had got stuck in front of her yard for weeks.
Tshabadira, 66, said service delivery had long collapsed in the municipality.
“This sewage has been flowing since last month and the smell is so unbearable, and if I don’t do anything about it nobody else will,” Tshabadira said.
“When it has rained, even taxis can’t use this road because of the flooding that happens.”
At the same time taps in the area have also run dry.
Her neighbour Gabriel Phatshoane said: “We are used to being without both water and electricity here, in fact nothing is going right in this municipality.”
Taxi driver Thabo Keepile said the poor state of the roads that are riddled with potholes was concerning for his vehicle.
“I’ve been a taxi driver for six years, I knock off very tired with back pains due to driving in these bad roads for eight hours a day,” Keepile said.
He said he has had to replace wheel bearings every month due to wear and tear caused by the roads.
Mandisa Kabi, 43, who is unemployed and survives on social grants, said she was forced to spend about R100 on water to be able to do her laundry.
“Life without water is difficult, especially now during Covid-19,” Kabi said.
She said she has got used to regular power cuts but vowed she would not cast her vote during local government elections.
“Why should I vote? we are living in a dead town where nothing works,” she said.
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