Long-term solution sought after sporadic outages leave Brooklyn residents enraged
Residents in Brooklyn had to navigate life without electricity this week due to a power outage.
Although the power has been restored, residents say they had to endure recurring outages, saying they were without power on Sunday as well as on the morning of July 23.
Cobie Odendaal, a community member from Brooklyn, said the ongoing power disruptions affect thousands of people who depend on electricity to work, cook, and stay safe.
'The economic system comes to a standstill. People are losing electrical equipment. No fridge or tea,' she said.
She said the uncertainty around power availability has disrupted her development work with children.
'I do a lot of my work online. If I don't have power or Wi-Fi, that work stops. People are frustrated.'
Ward 56 Councillor Tiaan Dippenaar confirmed that this has become a weekly problem.
'The infrastructure is just not in a good state at all. It's a continuous cycle of no power, and the residents are extremely frustrated.'
Dippenaar explained that while about 90% of affected properties had been reconnected by Tuesday evening, another explosion caused a fresh outage on Wednesday, plunging the entire ward into darkness again.
'They just come and fix, then leave again. And then it blows out, and they come and fix it again. We need to find the root cause and resolve it permanently.'
The metro has confirmed that its teams responded to the first incident, identified multiple medium-voltage cable faults, and restored power to most of the area.
According to metro spokesperson Lindela Mashigo, the most recent outage was caused by a broken overhead line in Anderson Street, which has since been repaired.
'The metro acknowledges the frustration caused by repeated outages,' said Mashigo, adding that many of the faults affecting the Brooklyn area are the result of historical infrastructure damage.
'Some of the outages are linked to previous damage during Wi-Fi installations and the ongoing BRT project on Lynnwood Road.
'These factors, combined with ageing infrastructure, make the network vulnerable to unpredictable faults.'
Mashigo noted that budget and human resource constraints have affected turnaround times in some cases, but reassured residents that the metro continues to prioritise critical repairs.
Although no technical investigation has been launched into this week's incidents specifically, Mashigo confirmed that regular network inspections and condition assessments are ongoing across Tshwane.
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