GRAAFF-REINET NEWS — Monday morning, February 13, marked the third week that the district offices of the Department of Education in Murray Street, Graaff-Reinet have been without power, and it now seems that some school hostels are also under threat of being cut off.
The electricity at the Department’s offices has been off since Monday, January 30, due to outstanding accounts. This is obviously causing a great deal of inconvenience to those working there. Employees are having to use their own cellphones for e-mails and phone calls - it is not known whether they will be recompensed for this.The lack of artificial light is also not ideal, with no power either for fans or air-conditioning.
Some employees are working out of other department offices to be able to do administrative work on their systems. Others are taking their work laptops home and downloading e-mails and documents. The telephone switchboard is also not operational, so no incoming phone calls to the landline can be received.
On Tuesday this week, some schools in Graaff-Reinet received notice that power would be cut to their hostels if the outstanding accounts were not paid.
One principal who was approached by the Advertiser confirmed this, saying that he had referred the matter to the District. Another was unwilling to talk to the media, suggesting that the question should be addressed to the District Director.
However, Nickie de Bruyn, office manager at the Department of Education in Graaff-Reinet, was also not prepared to comment on the matter. Provincial spokesperson Mali Mtima informed the Advertiser that there was an agreement with municipalities that if schools were in arrears, they would not be cut off so that learning would not be interrupted. He also stated that district offices would instead be cut off, and seemed unaware that this had already happened in Graaff-Reinet. He promised to investigate the matter.
The Dr Beyers Naudé Municipality was also contacted in this regard, but at the time of going to press, no response had been received from the Municipality.
Residents may remember that a similar problem was experienced in April last year when the Camdeboo Municipality cut off electrical service to the Department of Education for several weeks.
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