I observed that the lack of electricity in some households has created a divide in terms of electricity access due to the uncertainty of whether the other households that are located outside the existing substation will get a connection soon. Although the whole village use wood fuel for cooking, during discussions with women who did not have electricity connection, the subject of household electricity connection provoked some tension in the
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conversation, which I consider having come from the disillusionment of not having an electricity connection in their homes.
A sense of discontent when the subject of electricity came to the fore is illustrated when one woman explained the problem that they now face with their children who leave the house at night to go and watch television in the beer hall. The following is a narration given by one of the informants expressing some discontent:
“Our plea is that may the electricity reach all the households and that we get a bigger generator that produces enough electricity for cooking. Now if you observe we have another problem with some of our children, in the evening they will be in the shops and bars all because they want to watch television. And if you try to forbid them from going there, they will tell you that at school they are being made fun of by others because they do not know about a television. They say, “when others talk about what they see on television they laugh at me because I do not know anything about it, so I go there to watch so that when others boast about what they have seen I can also boast of what I have seen.” Even if you tell them “in the evening nobody is going!” However, when you check for them when they are supposed to be sleeping they would have snuck away from their beds. It is painful that these children do not listen to you because of the television at the bar. If there was electricity in our homes we would look for televisions to watch at home so that the child’s thoughts are on staying at home and obeying us…This is when they will start learning about prostitution and drinking in the bar” (Informant No. 16, Focus Group Discussion 5/9/2014).
However, the opinion of the above informant, who has no household electricity, varies significantly from that of another informant who has electricity in her home. She believes that the introduction of electricity is a good thing for her children and says:
“I want to add by saying how electricity has been so good to us. The introduction of electricity, it is a good thing for us because we now have televisions like those in Harare; we are now saying Harare should come here, because we now have it here. Because our children here and the children in Harare, they are now on the same level, they are the same. Everything that they are watching in Harare our children here are also watching the same thing. Therefore, electricity is good for us, even soccer played outside the country we are even watching it here! Electricity has been a good thing for us. We used to have many problems before electricity. At one time, a room burnt down because my children had used a burning wooden stick as a lamp to search for clothes to wear when preparing to go out at night. They did not notice that some ambers fell onto the clothes and caught on fire. Their clothes and the beds burned up. This was all because we did not have electricity. Having access to electricity is good because now that we have electricity we can even sleep with the lights on. I am very thankful that electricity has done a good thing for us... As a mother this is a good thing because our children that we live with, in our homes, some of them are just born here and do not
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know or even travel as far as the tarred road, these children are afraid, they were afraid of electricity. Therefore, the introduction of electricity to our village helped open our children’s minds; to know what electricity is and that it is not something to be afraid of because now they can just switch them on and off whenever they want… Even the children were saying, “we are also going to have electricity at our house!” Ah we saw that this was a good thing so when we worked it was not painful for us because we wanted electricity.” (Informant No.13, Focus Group Discussion 5/9/2014).
Therefore, these different opinions highlight the differences in lifestyle and access to information technologies such as television created by the access to electricity.
In summary, this chapter highlighted the energy sources in Chipendeke village with specific focus on hydropower and wood fuel. Hydropower generates electricity for purposes such as lighting, refrigeration, cell phone charging, television and radio. Wood fuel, which is mostly collected by women from the surrounding mountainous areas, is used for cooking and ironing. The chapter also presents the financial and gender aspects associated with how villagers access electricity. Because there are other homes without electricity access, some respondents expressed their opinions on how the lack of electricity has affected their homes.
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