RUSTENBURG HERALD - RUSTENBURG - Is it load shedding? No. Is it a cable fault? Yes. Is it a widespread outage? Yes. But is it load shedding? Also, yes. Power will be restored at 01:00. No - it won’t. Power will now be restored at 07:30. Still - no. Power is back again. Ten minutes later: Power off again! Load shedding to be implemented from 11:00. If RLM chooses to implement load shedding. it will commence at 13:00.
If you are as confused as we are, you probably reside in Rustenburg.
After numerous promises, endeavours to “improve” timeous communication and countless “We apologise for the inconvenience” messages, the end seems to be in sight. Not the end of our service delivery woes, but the end of Rustenburg.
How much longer can we endure vague excuses, incompetent management and “patiently” waiting for our voices to be heard? To top it all off - no one seems to know what is going on. Is RLM blatantly lying to residents or are they just thát incompetent?
Conflicting messages were circulating on social media after a widespread power outage on Sunday, 23 February starting at 21:00. (This after some areas in town were already without electricity, going on for between two to four days). The messages - meant to inform and update residents - sent by Ward Councillors, Customer Call Centre and concerned community members, seemed to just lead to more confusion, rather than clarification.
Rustenburg Herald reached out to the spokesperson of Rustenburg Local Municipality, Andrew Seome, to offer some (any?) kind of explanation about the latest goings on, but received no reply.
The Mayor’s office, did however, circulate a (very vague) statement on Monday, 24 February, as follows: “As per the directive given by the Minister, the municipality is required and expected to implement stage 6 loadshedding.” The statement continued: “Vandalism and illegal connections continue to be a huge challenge that we are experiencing as municipality, and contributes to the many electrical challenges we are facing.”
In utter frustration, protests have been taking place in and around town over the last two weeks. On Thursday, 20 February, protest action was reported on the R510 road next to Boitekong Mall. Burning tyres and stones blocked both lanes.
On Monday, 24 February, the road leading to Zinniaville was blocked by burning tyres and consequently, with both teachers and learners struggling to get to school and continuous water and electricity cuts, Zinniaville Secondary School was forced to close for the day and continued to be closed on Tuesday.
Also on Tuesday, the community of Rustenburg North blocked the roads at Foord Street and Nelson Mandela Drive next to Rustenburg Mall with burning tyres and big rocks in response to (alleged) service delivery problems. Rustenburg Herald tried (in vain) to make head or tails of the situation, but looking at the communication that went out on service delivery groups over the last few days, even Ward Councillors are in the dark (pun intended) about the current state of affairs.
To illustrate this point, some of the messages posted are published adjacent to this story.
Prepare to be confused...
