Snooze saves Orlando baby
HOME HIT: RUBBER BULLET FIRED BY POLICE AT PROTESTERS SMASHES WINDOW
Angry residents say they cannot afford prepaid electricity.
Atoddler could have been hit by a rubber bullet when the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD) clashed with Orlando West residents in Soweto yesterday.
Nine-month-old Owami Molefe was asleep at home when police fired at an angry crowd.
One round went through a window into a part of the house where the child often plays.
Owami’s grandmother, Queen Molefe, said: “My granddaughter could have been hit by the bullet as she likes standing by the wardrobe, where the police fired.
“I don’t even know what I am going to tell my daughter.”
Police were trying to disperse a crowd when the incident happened.
Trouble started when police were escorting Eskom customer relations Soweto area manager Henry Mtshali, who had just addressed residents at Uncle Tom’s community centre, out of the area. “He did not say anything,” said angry residents as they left the centre.
People in the area want Eskom to remove prepaid meters from their homes and reintroduce metered electricity.
“You end up using up to R1 000 a month on these boxes. We don’t have that kind of money,” said Maphakiso Nhlapho.
Residents claimed Eskom had imposed the prepaid system.
“There was never a proper consultation and Eskom never communicated effectively with the residents when the project was rolled out,” said Busi Vilankulu, of the community task team.
Vilankulu added pleas for Eskom to stop the project fell on deaf ears. “On March 5, we asked Eskom to stop, with immediate effect, the switchover project as people were complaining about high rates on the prepaid meters,” she said.
Residents also claimed former energy minister Malusi Gigaba said electricity debts in Soweto had to be written off.
Vilankulu said Eskom was cut- ting off the electricity supply to people who owed the utility money. It was also “automatically” putting them on prepaid.
Mtshali said people were using too much electricity, which was the reason for the high charges.
“We cannot reduce the cost of rates as the cost of generating electricity has to be taken into consideration,” he said.
Mtshali said the switchover system was introduced as a better way to monitor illegal connections. He added the people at the meeting were not representative of the 4 700 households in Orlando West.
Vulankulu told Mtshali to cut off the electricity for everyone in the area until the power utility was ready to meet their demands.