By Thupeyo Muleya
Beitbridge town was plunged into darkness for five days last week following a major technical fault at Triangle feeder that affected power supply to the area.
Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority spokesman Mr Fullard Gwasira said engineers from the power utility worked round the clock to rectify the problem.
Normal power supply only resumed on Saturday after Tuesday’s blackout.
The power outage also triggered an acute water shortage in Beitbridge town as alternative power sources failed to cope with demand.
The only Zimbabwe National Water Authority treatment plant in Beitbridge relies on electricity to pump water to consumers.
The local authority has also been failing to meet the daily water demands for one of the busiest ports of entry in Southern Africa.
Zinwa has been operating on an emergency system basis and has been pumping a third of the 15 000 cubic metres of water needed per day.
Many tapes ran dry last Tuesday night forcing people to make use of the 32 boreholes drilled at strategic points around the town by the town council at the height of the cholera outbreak in 2008.
The town last had power supplies on Tuesday afternoon and since then most businesses and households had been relying on generators for electricity.
The border post and the district hospital and other essential service providers had also to run on generators.
"There is a fault along the Triangle feeder, which supplies Beitbridge with power and our engineers are working round the clock to restore power to the town.
"You will realise that the feeder has continuously been having problems on joins on the electricity supply cables. The feeder was struck by lighting some time last year and we have been battling to replace the damaged joins and since then, we have been making use of temporary cable joiners. Thus the joins would burn if put to severe strain because of the workload.
"However, we are in the midst of acquiring the permanent joiners as a lasting solution to the problem. Our consumers should bear with us as the engineers have assured us that by the end of the day power supplies would have been restored to the town," said Mr Gwasira last week.
He said Zesa engineers were in the midst of repairing and installing several electricity cables, which had been vandalised.
"We, however, do not do three day load shedding programmes. This happens if there is a fault along the cables or feeders and is not reported to our deports. Currently, we are repairing and replacing some of the cables, which were vandalised by copper cable thieves in most areas where there are constant power supply problems," he said.
Last year, the Government spent US$58 million in replacing electricity supply cables throughout the country with most of them having been vandalised by copper cable thieves.
Published by The Herald 30 August 2010
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