Mbare hostels plunged into darkness

RESIDENTS of Mbare hostels have spent more than four months without electricity after the Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company cut off power supply over arrears.

The affected flats include Mbare hostels, Matapi hostels, Shawasha hostels and Nenyere hostel where residents have expressed concern over the situation.

They said the blackout had resulted in increased criminal activities which had affected their day to day business and attributed the switching off of electricity to failure by the city council, who are the owners of the flats, to pay electricity bills to Zesa.

Mbare Residents Association secretary-general Mr Henry Shadaya said the situation had negatively affected the residents most of whom relied on power for their day to day activities.

“We have had the problem of electricity for over four months. The issue is being driven mainly by the fact that as Mbare hostel dwellers, we rely on council but from the look of things, council has not been paying dues to Zesa and we have been cut off.

Mr Shadaya said they tried to negotiate with Zesa to restore power to no avail.

“We do not know what more to do because the information we got is that council has not been paying Zesa for years and now the burden is lying on the residents.

“There are now a lot of challenges such as theft, assaults and murders as criminals are taking advantage of this black out.

“If we do not have electricity, life is very difficult because Mbare has many widows, vendors, child-headed families and elderly people.

We are therefore, appealing to the City of Harare and Zesa to restore electricity and bring relief to the people of Mbare.”

Mr Clever Mukutaire from Mbare hostels said: “We have not had electricity for a very long time which spans for over three months now.