Residents of Brandvlei have reached their wits end, with outdated infrastructure aggravating debilitating power cuts, disrupting their lives on a daily basis.

Given the poor and extremely old electricity poles along the gravel road between Loeriesfontein and Brandvlei, any change in the weather in the Brandvlei area is enough to obstruct the flow of power to the town. While poles are constantly being replaced and repaired, the problem is not resolved by this ad hoc approach. Instead, it is worsened, leaving residents in the dark for even longer periods of time. This is in addition to already debilitating and random loadshedding conditions felt by the whole country.

What further exacerbates the situation is that when the power goes out, so do the town’s cellphone network and banking services. Struggling residents are also losing untold amounts of food stuff when the fridges go off. Those lucky enough to have generators, are incurring costs they can barely afford. Access to emergency services is also hampered. This is especially worrying for residents, who are being hit hard by opportunistic crime, including theft and assault cases. It is also especially disturbing for those who have no other means of transport but to walk in the dark, without a cellphone service and without access to the police.

Perhaps worst of all, however, is that the impact on water provision has been catastrophic, with especially higher lying areas being hit very hard. It is ironic that the town’s multi-million rand water system has become more of an embarrassment than an asset, failing to ensure any provision for water supply when the power and pumps go off.

The shortcomings of Eskom and the Hantam municipality are worsening the socio-economic circumstances of Brandvlei residents. Sadly, there seems to be no political will to come up with a plan to remedy the situation.

The DA has referred the matter to our counterparts at national, to try and address at a higher level, given that the persistent complaints of councillors and residents continue to fall on deaf ears.

We only hope that come the Local Government Elections, people will wake up to the fact that it is time for the current, uncaring local government to be replaced with a people-centred municipality, that puts the needs of its residents first.

 

Issued by The DA