Some communities in Free State continue to suffer power outages

Some communities in the Free State continue to suffer power outages despite government efforts to improve the electricity supply. Residents of Bethulie, south of Bloemfontein, say they go without electricity for days.

The power outages also impact mobile networks, leaving residents unable to reach the police and other emergency services. 78-year-old diabetic Matshidiso Barnard relies on electricity to keep her medication intact.

Barnard says the constant power outages put her life at risk.

“It’s because of the electricity that goes out for a long time. My medication must be in a cold place – I’ve now been asked to store my medication in the clinic. So that is where I can inject myself, because here at home, I cannot store it because of the lack of electricity. Sometimes I can’t reach the clinic due to lack of transport. I must call an ambulance to pick me up. Or they come with my medication to inject me. It is because of the electricity that goes out often.”

Meanwhile, the Kopanong municipality says the electricity crisis in Bethulie emanates from aging infrastructure.

Mayor of Kopanong municipality is Xolani Tseletsele explains:

“We have picked a number of problems which are leading to on and off leading unstable electricity to our communities. So the approach is that as of Monday, we are going on a programme where we go to communities to report back on the level of work done in the renewal of the electricity infrastructure. Throughout the municipality, the infrastructure is as old as 1945, so you find out in other areas they’ve got transformers that need to be changed. They have got underground electricity lines that need to be changed and all of those problems as and when the time goes on are issues that we are going to resolve.”