South Africa: Electricity Theft - Kliptown 'Hero' Brings Light to Forgotten Community

analysis

Sparks sits in his shack in an informal settlement in Kliptown smoking a pipe with his friends. Just above his head a tangle of wires snakes out of the shack in all directions, a veritable distribution board supplying power to hundreds of residents of one of Johannesburg's oldest townships. His connections are illegal but it's the only way residents here can access electricity. By BHEKI C SIMELANE.

To residents of the informal settlement, Sparks - a nickname given to him by the community - is a hero. For nearly a decade, the 24-year-old school drop-out, has shimmied up and down electricity poles of Eskom and Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) providing shack dwellers with power where Eskom has failed to do so. He is the reason many children in the settlement can have a hot cup of tea before heading to school. And why in the winter, they are able to keep warm, despite their empty bellies.

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