They say the area has been turned into a hotspot for criminality with some getting robbed due to the lack of electricity at night.

A desperate Roodepan family has pleaded with Kimberley’s Sol Plaatje Municipality to restore power in the area. The family, which is also affected by the outage, fears that their 75-year-old asthmatic relative, who survives on a nebulizer, might die due to lack of power.

Berenice van Wyk, who is the daughter of the sick man, says “they must switch on power immediately, or as soon as possible because you see how my father is lying. It’s not good for us, it feels like we are going to lose my father in the next few days because there is no power.”

Other residents say they are equally frustrated.

“It really affects us, our food is rotting, children have to go to school and clothes need to be ironed. As you see, the streetlights are not working. It’s frustrating, we cannot cook. It’s frustrating because kids cannot go to school. We cannot find candles in the shops, the gas is high, and there's no wood, so we are tired. I do not know, something must be done. Last night five guys got robbed, and we couldn’t do anything. They had guns, there is nothing we can do about it,” says another member of the community.

Meanwhile, the Sol Plaatje Municipality says its technicians are working around the clock to restore power in the area after a contractor allegedly damaged electrical cables.

Municipal spokesperson, Thoko Riet, says: “An envy cable was damaged by contractors, which is the cable feeding Roodepan. That is the reason why most parts of Roodepan were without power. But fortunately, most parts of Roodepan's power were restored. We have some parts which don’t have power currently but our electricians are doing what they can to restore power currently.”

Residents have urged the municipality to speedily restore power.

SABC News