ABU DHABI A defaulting landlord, unpaid utility bills and weeks without water and electricity are becoming a common narrative in the lives of many Abu Dhabi residents who live in shared villa complexes on the outskirts of the city.
Within three weeks after XPRESS reported a story about how scores of families were living without water and electricity since December last year in a villa complex in the Khalifa City A, a similar case has surfaced.
XPRESS found another 30 families who have been forced to live in appalling conditions without water and electricity for over two weeks now in their villas in Mohammad Bin Zayed City in the Mussafah Industrial City. In both cases, civic authorities have disconnected the utility services after the landlord failed to pay the bills.
Everything possible
According to tenants of the four affected villas in Sector 19 of the Mohammad Bin Zayed City, there is an outstanding amount of over Dh318,000 the landlord has to settle in utility bills. “We have done everything possible from our side. We have gone to the police; we have approached the public prosecution. But without the landlord settling the bills, water and electricity cannot be reconnected in our houses,” said Rashid Ali, a Pakistani tenant who has been living in a studio apartment in the villa complex since September 2013. He pays an annual rent of Dh28,000.
“I have a newborn baby who is just 15 days old. When my wife came home from the hospital, there was no water and electricity,” said Ali who works for a bank in Abu Dhabi.
His wife Saima said she is using emergency lamps to take care of the baby at night. “She is crying all night because it is pitch dark and the room gets all stuffy.”
Another Pakistani tenant, Mohammed Ilyas, said his wife is struggling to take care of their three children without water in the kitchen and toilets.
“Nobody can imagine how our families are surviving without water and electricity. We have to carry water from a tank outside for our daily needs. There is no AC, television or refrigerator. How long can we live like this?” asked Ilyas who works for an advertising company. Ilyas said he was also looking for a new place though he had spent a lot of money on renovating the one bedroom apartment.
Many families have already moved out after the real agent washed his hands of the problem. “Till last week, he was reassuring us that the landlord will sort out the problem soon. Now he is asking us to move out. But what will happen to our money?” asked another tenant.
When contacted, the agent responsible for the property said the villas cannot be rented out anymore and tenants have to vacate. “We will reimburse the rents very soon,” he told the reporter.
