We, the undersigned residents and businesses in Benoni, through Cllr Lornette Joseph, call on the City of Ekurhuleni to urgently upgrade, strengthen and future-proof the electricity infrastructure serving our ward.
We continue to experience electricity interruptions, network instability and low and high voltage fluctuations, which can place household and business electrical equipment at risk. While faults will occur, residents should not have to depend on repeated reactive repairs when critical infrastructure requires planned investment and preventative maintenance.
We call on the City to:
1. Complete and bring the Morehill Substation upgrade online, including the upgraded panels and associated infrastructure, to improve network security and reduce the need to shift Ward 27's load onto already strained substations.
2. Replace the remaining oil-filled line between Morehill and Rynfield with modern infrastructure.
3. Upgrade secondary substations and transformers across Ward 27 to address capacity, overload and reliability concerns.
4. Strengthen preventative maintenance, including regular testing, vegetation management and proactive replacement of ageing or vulnerable equipment.
5. Provide adequate technical resources, including additional test-van teams and cherry pickers, to improve fault detection, maintenance and restoration times.
6. Protect the electricity network from cable theft and damage, particularly along major routes, including investigating the conversion of vulnerable overhead infrastructure to underground cabling where feasible.
7. Replace damaged or inadequate distribution pole and top-pole covers and address other identified vulnerabilities across the network.
Ward 27 (in its current and future demarcation) needs a reliable electricity network and not a cycle of breakdown, repair and breakdown again.
We call on the City of Ekurhuleni, the City Manager, Executive Mayor, MMC for Energy and HOD for Energy to provide a clear programme and timeframe for these infrastructure upgrades and to report back to residents on progress.
We are asking the City to invest in Ward 27’s electricity infrastructure now, before the next major failure.