Electricity Utility Polls and Live Wires Threaten Persa’s Villgers in Akhaltsikhe District

The electric power utility polls are not firmly fixed in the ground and the power post wires are being pulled down in the village of Persa, Akhaltsikhe District.  Villagers in Persa have become rather concerned about this problem.

Gulo Kokhodze, Akhaltsikhe 

“The polls are basically destroyed and this impacts the supply of energy. The electricity is cut all the time as the posts and the cables are old. If a post falls down it will fall directly on my house, and I will the electricity will kill me and perhaps even one who is just passing by, “stated Mariam Gogolauri.

Gogutsa Lomidze lives alone. She complains about old polls just as do other villagers: “Two power posts that stand in my yard are half fallen over and the cables will fall down at any minute. A wire fell down a while ago. As the polls are flimsy we tried to find a thin and light weighted boy so that he could climb up the post and fix the wire. If a heavy weighted man climbed up the post it immediately would crash down.”

She said it is dangerous to go outside the house at night. A wire might be hanging somewhere and can kill a man because there are no outside lighting and it is dark everywhere.

“I might be old but I am still afraid of current situation.”

“Wires hold the polls up,” say the locals.

“Wires hang so low that even a small child reach out for them. Soon the soil will become soft from the rain and the posts will soon fall down,” say Temur Migriauli.

The Deputy Akhaltsikhe District Governor knows what concerns the Persi village inhabitants, but…

“This problem goes beyond our ability to solve it, as the energy distribution company must and resolve the problem.  As far as I know the power company already has a plan of resolving the problem,” stated Bidzina Maisuradze, Deputy Akhaltsikhe District Governor.

Zurab Mamukashvili, manager of Energo- Pro Georgia distribution company Akhaltsikhe Service Center says that there are old electricity wires not only in Persa village but also in the all of the Akhaltsikhe District. “We have our plan and have now finished the repair 1, 5 kilometer long stretch along a road and changed a total of 35 power posts in Atskuri Section.” said Mamukashvili.

 Energo -Pro Georgia Akhatsikhe Service Center manager states that the rehabilitation works are being carried out on all territories that are facing the most difficult conditions. “I did not know if the situation in Persa village was so dramatic in comparison to others. We must check this information because there are instances when the population stretches wires arbitrarily and those wires are not our responsibility. To make a long story short, I can not speak about the village without having personally studied the case.”

Zurab Mamukashvili says that sometimes people panic without having any serousreason: “Yesterday someone called and said that the wire was torn. I sent a brigade, and it turned out that one family did not have electricity and they called the whole brigade to fix this simple problem. In the end it was the family’s personal problem and we were not responsible for the solution.”

Zurab Mamukashvili can not specify when the power supply network will be repaired in Persa village. “I do not know for sure but we might start rehabilitation activities tomorrow or a bit later. However, there will be no complete rehabilitation. We will repair only those posts that are facing the most difficult condition.”