In Mbare a significant number of the residents now get their power for free. They are helped in part by a group of electricians who believe it is the people's right to have free power. They reconnect anyone willing to pay a small free.
One of the crusading electricians – Taurai, who doesn't want his full name revealed – has just been called by an elderly widow who had been cut off five days before.
When they arrive, the 72-year-old granny takes her time emerging from a darkened bedroom.
"On Friday they just came as I was preparing my cup of tea to drink with my BP tablets. The next thing I knew I was disconnected," she says.
She has to support four grandchildren on a monthly pension payment of $25. Her face creased with both worry and old age, she explains that each month she paid the electricity company $10.
One look at her bill shows it was not nearly enough. Accumulated over months, her balance is a staggering $860. It has clearly been a painful few days without power.
"My granny needs electricity to cook, to wash, and to make a cup of tea – she likes tea," says her granddaughter. "My granny's too old, she can't live without electricity."
But thanks to the "bush electrician" the lights will soon be back on. In the street outside her house they remove the cover of the electricity distribution box and install a new circuit breaker.
This is no botched job. The bush electrician prides himself on maintaining safety standards at least as good as the power company.
He speaks as he strips a wire with his pliers: "ZESA is overcharging these people. It’s not illegal."
There's certainly no fear of getting caught. The electricity says he has been arrested once but was let off with a fine. As they work a police officer walks by and waves her hand.
"Many of the officers have been reconnected by us as well," he says with a smile.
With the granny happily making her first cup of tea in days, the bush electrician packs his tool box and leaves.
On the way he stops at another distribution box. This one has been wrenched open at the back and there are about 12 wires emerging haphazardly.
"These are illegal and dangerous connections – what if a child walked past here?" says Levy stripping a wire with his teeth. He displays how the live wires are threaded and connected on top of the circuit breaker – on a live connection!
Such is the culture of non-payment in the city's ghettoes that it is estimated that a significant number of people here do not pay anything. Responsibility for clearing up the mess falls on the state power firm ZESA.
Its strategy so far has been to try to threaten lengthy jail terms for those who steal electricity. A series of adverts have been published showing a newspaper cutting with the headline 'Pair jailed 10 years for reconnecting electricity.'
The story is about two men from Bulawayo’s Nkulumane suburb who in April were sentenced to an effective 10 years’ imprisonment for illegally reconnecting electricity after power supplies to their home had been cut by the authorities for default of payment.
Sindiso Sibanda and Nqobani Mhlanga were convicted on their own plea of guilty when they appeared before Western Commonage Court magistrate, Shepherd Munjanja, on charges of contravening Section 3(b) of the Electricity Amendment Act Number 12 of 2007(Chapter 13:09).
Despite the threatening adverts, ZESA has so far been a losing battle. "It is a serious offence to illegally reconnect electricity on your own," says Fullard Gwasira, the ZESA spokesman. "If you get caught you will be punished with a lengthy jail sentence. To avoid such always make sure you pay up your electricity bill on time."
Gwasira says people must move away from these processes as "they're actually taking us backward."
And ZESA is already far behind. Nationally it is not exactly clear how much electricity is stolen. But the company's problems run far deeper than that.
At the top, its chief executive has been forced to resign. Operationally, things are no better. A decade of underinvestment has left Zimbabwe desperately short of generating capacity. But the worst is still to come.
If you are one of the minority in the ghettoes who chooses to pay a bill and stay legal, your "reward" will be a shocking bill that is an estimate of your usage.
As people struggle to pay given the scarcity of the US dollars, the bush electricians are likely to get busier and busier.
"We are giving back what belongs to the people. It's not a luxury," says the electrician. "The granny got back her better life and her dignity. I'm not afraid to connect – anytime, anywhere."
Post published in: Zimbabwe News