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Nqobile Tshili, Features Correspondent
FOR Ms Ayanda Ndlovu (40) completing building her house in Pumula South suburb in Bulawayo and moving from a rented apartment to a place she called home was a dream come true.
In 2005, she bought a residential stand from a local property developer and it took her nearly five years to complete constructing her house.
Despite the economic challenges that bedevilled the country between 2007 and 2008, Ms Ndlovu was able to complete constructing her six-roomed house and moved from her rented apartment.
She says it took her nearly a year for her to accept that she had to relocate to a house without electricity, having enjoyed using the energy in her previous home.
Ms Ndlovu says life has not been easy since her relocation to the un-electrified suburb which brought new challenges to her.
“I can hardly say I’m an urbanite except for the fact that I have running water. We rely on gas stoves for cooking and solar energy for lighting. However, most of my electric appliances have been rendered useless since I relocated in 2010. I haven’t watched television in my home for years and I’m afraid that the fridge and other electrical appliances may end up not functioning as they have not been in use for nearly a decade,” she says.
Ms Ndlovu said residents in the suburb are even afraid of travelling at night as darkness would be haunting them.
Her challenges are not peculiar to her alone and other Pumula South suburb residents but the problem is common to citizens living in many other suburbs across the country.
Police have said crime rate in the un-electrified suburbs was also high with some of the cases unaccounted for.
Recently, a 42-year-old woman from Cowdray Park suburb was raped and killed while coming from fetching firewood.
Bulawayo police spokesperson Chief Inspector Precious Simango said women are more vulnerable to criminals with some of them breaking into their homes.
“Crime rates in suburbs without electricity are generally high as compared to those with electricity. And in some of the incidents suspects are never arrested as they would not have been identified.
“For instance, we have attended to incidents where criminals break into a house, rape a woman and threaten to kill her in the middle of the night. The victim would fail to describe or identify her attacker as the crime would have been committed in the dark,” said Chief Insp Simango.
She said when the victims make reports the following day, the criminal would be long gone.
The electricity problem does not only affect residents but it has led to environmental crimes as well.
Residents who stay in houses without electricity extensively use firewood while others rely on LP gas as a source of energy.
Recently, Bulawayo City Council officials raided more than 50 LP gas dealers for operating illegally and most of these traders operate in suburbs without electricity.
Environmental Management Agency Bulawayo provincial manager Mr Decent Ndlovu said the environmental watchdogs are concerned with the rate of environmental destruction in urban areas without electricity.
He said Cowdray Park, Mbundane and Emthunzini residents are some of the worst culprits in degrading the environment.
“There is environmental degradation as a result of massive firewood use because you’re talking of thousands of households wanting the use of trees. And the second thing is that it has led to the sprouting of illegal selling of LP Gas which poses health and safety issues to the people,” said Mr Ndlovu.
He said EMA was enforcing the law to reduce the environmental crimes but this is always temporary.
Mr Ndlovu said the best solution would be for Zesa to electrify these suburbs as residents would always use the available alternative energies.
Zesa spokesperson Mr Fullard Gwasira said although the parastatal has a responsibility of providing electricity to the nation, private property developers were also short changing clients by under servicing their stands.
“A lot of projects are left without tarred roads, sewer systems and even water and electricity. These will pass through cost from developers pushing them to business without prior arrangements. These are the reasons why some projects go for longer periods without electricity connections,” said Mr Gwasira.
He said Zesa is pushing for a law that will compel property developers to also install relevant infrastructure so that the utility company does not incur unintended costs.
Mr Gwasira said shortage of foreign currency and theft of electricity infrastructure was worsening the situation as the utility company has to go back and forth on its programmes.
“The smallest transformer costs $8 000 while we have a cumulative figure of 4 000 in vandalism of transformers. We are losing about three transformers every night. That means for the transformers that have been vandalised, we need about $32 million and we are continuously going back and forth on these projects,” said Mr Gwasira.
Energy and Power Development Minister Dr Joram Gumbo blamed foreign currency shortages as the major cause of delays in electrification of some suburbs.
“The problem is with transformers. We’re not manufacturing transformers in the country and due to forex shortages, importation is difficult,” said Dr Gumbo.
He said at the moment, most of the transformers that Zesa was installing were funded by clients who were able to mobilise resources for themselves. — @nqotshili
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