This resulted in protesters directing their anger towards foreign-owned shops.
Illegal electricity connections in the area have become rife, with live power wires criss-crossing the tiny streets
It’s reported that thousands of residents in Road Reserve (Ramaphosa) are stealing electricity from the municipality by means of illegal connections to their shacks.
Residents are allegedly tapping power from the high mast lights and the nearby traffic lights, causing perpetual outages.
According to Reiger Park SAPS station commander, Col Else Mashinini, on June 20, a swarm of Red Ants officials, EMPD and Public Order Policing (POP) members, as well as members of the Ekurhuleni Electricity Department, converged on the informal settlement to disconnect illegal connections.
The scene, however, soon became chaotic when the residents allegedly started pelting the ‘visitors’ with bricks and other objects.
A fight reportedly ensued between the involved parties, whereupon the protesters allegedly made their way to nearby foreign-owned shops and threatened the shop owners.
“Many of the foreign shop owners were later escorted out of the area by the police. A group of people broke into several foreign-owned shops with the intention to steal, but found nothing as the stock had already been removed,” said Mashinini.
Reports also surfaced that a group of protesters threatened to vandalise the ward councillor’s house, located in Ramaphosa.
Mashinini said no injuries were reported, but a case of public violence is being investigated.
The residents’ account of the incident, however, contradicts that of the police.
Residents allege that the Red Ants and the metro police started shooting residents with rubber bullets following a war of words between the residents and Red Ants over the disconnection.
The alleged shooting of residents, including innocent people who were not even part of the argument, is said to have provoked a storm of protest from residents who then swiftly retaliated.
This then led to them throwing stones and other object at the Red Ants, before taking their frustrations to the foreign-owned shops.
According to residents several people were injured and subsequently hospitalised.
Police later managed to bring the situation under control.
Residents claim that metro police returned to the area during the midnight hours, forcefully entered people’s shack and arrested several people who they accused of inciting violence and conspiring to burn down the councillor’s house.
The arrested people were reportedly released without being charged with any criminal offences.
A well- known and active female resident said on condition of anonymity that residents resorted to illegal connections because they are fed up with the lack of service delivery in their area.
“We have on numerous occasions asked the municipality to electrify our homes and we are more than willing to use it legally and pay for it, just like the nearby communities.
“We always get sick from the toxic fumes and paraffin fumes from Primus stoves and imbawula (makeshift coal stoves). Many shacks and people got burned because of paraffin stoves and candles falling over.
“We know that people in the surrounding areas who have electricity always complain about one- or two-day blackouts apparently caused by illegal connections, but what about us who are forced to live without electricity daily?
“Those few isolated cases of outages give them a little taste of what it is like to live without electricity,’ said the resident.
Another resident of Ramaphosa, who is a community leader, said desperation has led residents to illegally connect electricity, adding that they have on numerous occasions requested the metro to supply them with electricity.
“Early this year residents marched to the civic centre in Boksburg and handed over a memorandum of demands to the municipality. Key to our grievances was the provision of electricity and houses, which the municipality has been promising people for years.
“The delays in rendering services has resulted in residents taking a decision that they would no longer wait patiently any more for the municipality to fulfil their basic needs and human rights.
“People have decided to take matters into their own hands and illegally connect the electricity that they need because the municipality has failed to deliver on its promises,” said the community leader.
The community leader also blamed ward councillor Eva Ngcwana for the problems faced by the community. He accused the councillor of corruption and working against residents.
“In the memorandum we handed over to the MMC, we stated that we have lost confidence in the councillor’s ability to lead us because she is involved in corrupt activities which have resulted in disappearance of people’s building material and allocation of people’s RDP houses to wrong people.
“Because we stood up to her, the councillor is now secretly using the EMPD and Red Ants to sabotage us.”
Ngcwana, however, denied the accusations, saying she is not working to undermine the community but instead doing her best to get the municipality to improve the lives of the people.
“I was not aware of any disconnection. The Red Ants have come to Road Reserve and disconnected illegal electricity connections about three times now, and they have never informed me about it.
“I remember, the other time I had to phone the energy department officials and asked them why they kept me in the dark about the disconnection of illegal connections.
“The answered that the disconnections are arranged and organised by the municipality’s finance department.”
