Residents with tampered City Power electricity meters, have until Friday, 30 June 2017, to register their meters and have them normalised by technicians free of charge. Registration can be done at City Power’s Head Office, 40 Heronmere Road, Booysens.
There are approximately 960 000 approved residential properties in Johannesburg, and despite Eskom supplying electricity to Orange Farm, most parts of Soweto, Sandton and areas in Region A, City Power is only billing 380 000 households for electricity.
If we wish to keep the City’s lights on, upgrade infrastructure and electrify more informal settlements, the non-payment for services due to bridged meters and illegal connections must become a thing of the past.
Further to this, illegal connections and bridged meters are extremely dangerous and can result in serious injury, or in worst case scenarios, death. Illegal connections also impacts on the lives of residents who are paying for services, as they overload our system and results in power surges and lengthy outages.
Tampering with the City’s infrastructure and vandalising City property, costs millions of Rands each year which could have otherwise been used to enhance and expand services.
It is imperative that we change residents’ mind-sets about non-payment for services, and the Department of Environment and Infrastructure Service Delivery will devise a strategic plan over the course of the next few weeks to ensure that we achieve this objective.
Community educational campaigns on the long term benefits of paying for services will also be ongoing.
As part of this plan, the City will also look to impose penalties against those found to be using illegal connections and bridged meters.
I urge all residents to be active community members and report any suspicious activity to JMPD (011 375 5911) or SAPS (10111), without confronting suspects, and to keep in mind that if they knowingly receive municipal services for which they are not paying, they are guilty of an offense.