The National Arts Festival taking place in Grahamstown seems to be a huge issue of concern to the Grahamstownians residence in terms of load shedding issues that are on going. The Makana Municipality seems to be unable to cope with the amount of energy that is in demand throughout the 11 day Festival.
Here below is what some people had to say about the load shedding at the Festival
Moses fro
m the blockhouse coffee shop: “we couldn’t sell coffee and the food we sell need to be warmed so it affected sales, we were not warned about the power cuts.”
Prarochna from Computicket:” we couldn’t sell any tickets, cause on Tuesday we made only two hours worth of sales for the whole day. We asthe staff basically we were busy doing nothing and the s cause we had to close our doors .Some shows were cancelled as the following we had to re-instatements for the shows.”
Sharon Meistre from the art gallery at the Steve Biko building: “the all day power cut on Tuesday affected us quite badly, couldn’t’ see any of the art work properly, the room was dark. Some people still come but it was almost like showing your art work in a dark place.”
Anonymous from the Grahamstown Pharmacy:” when we have a power failure can’t do anything. People with emergency cases and prescription have to wait until power comes back and some get frustrated because it is not a nothing to wait for important medication. We did not get warned about the power cut which was very very bad for business.”
Anonymous from the beauty spa:“we know that because ofthe Arts Fest in Grahamstown there two a lot of electricity being used. When customers come, they need electricity to do their nails and unfortunately the customers lost out because of that. That is money lost for our business which we can’t get back.
Person from the Laundry business:” it is very difficult to run a business without electricity. They happen to often for our liking, to run a business like this is without it is impossible. No one ever tells us about them, general attitude is what we can do.”
The Person from Kodak Express shop:” our jobs are on the line because there is a laser that needs electricity to operate and our boss has already replaced it once and if the electricity cuts again, he will have to close down the shop because that is how expensive it is. I’m sure they can deal with this better.”
The Person from the accessory shop: “power cuts definitely affected us because, we lose all our information on the till slips and can’t do cash up it is incredibly dark in here so people can’t see anything. Can’t see the art works.
It seems like the Municipality has been unable to cope properly with the demand of power throughout the festival. will this happen again come The Festival in 2012? we wait in anticipation!
by Thabiso Sihlali & Nokwazi Khumalo
No comments:
Post a Comment