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The Democratic Alliance (DA) in North West is concerned about the incessant power outages in the small farming community of Migdol, close to Schweizer-Reneke, costing agricultural enterprises thousands of Rands a day to keep afloat.

For the past four days, this community has been without electricity due to faulty infrastructure.  The Mamusa Local Municipality is dissolved in terms of Section 139(1)(c) and therefore not capacitated to attend to any technical challenges. To this end, contractors were called from Klerksdorp to do the necessary reparations, but electricity has still not been restored.

Subsequently, agricultural enterprises are compelled to make use of generators, costing them as much as R4000 per day per generator.

Without electricity, these companies are unable to aerate maize, grain and other crops to prevent it from decaying, directly impacting food security and the economy of the province.

Our initial attempts to reach the Municipal Administrator, Ronnie Jonas, failed, and we resorted to engaging with Premier Mokgoro’s office and the MEC for Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs (COGHSTA), Gordon Kegakilwe who referred us back to the Administrator.

The Administrator was made aware of the problem after which a technical team was arranged. This after he dismissed complaints from our councillors, stating that the municipality is dissolved and that they no longer serve as councillors.

The DA remains committed to delivering services to the people of North West and we will leave no stone unturned to ensure that the electricity infrastructure of Migdol is reviewed and upgraded.

Issued by DA