Several extensions in Louis Trichardt were affected by power outages on Wednesday morning.

The first outage occurred just after 06:00 and lasted until about 07:00. The second outage occurred just after 08:00 before the electricity supply was restored a few hours later.

The Makhado Municipality confirmed that a burning line clamp opposite Makhado Crossing, along the N1, is the reason for the outage. Areas affected by the outage included Makhado Crossing, the Eltivillas business area, Our Home Old Age Home and the town’s central business area from Joubert Street up to Extension 7. “We apologise for the inconvenience caused,” said the municipality.

Following the power outage, municipal spokesperson Mr Louis Bobodi made an urgent appeal to members of the public not to revert to being rude when affected by power outages. He said that during the outages, their call centre received several calls from residents wanting to know why their power was off. “Instead of listening to our explanation, people just kept on swearing and cursing our telephone operators. They did not want to listen to any reason,” Bobodi said. He added that, for now, they would let the matter rest, but if it should happen again, they would be forced to take the matter further.