Gordhan meets Eskom to resolve loadshedding crisis

Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan is currently meeting with Eskom executives to try and resolve the crisis brought on by Cyclone Idai that has cut off power imports from Mozambique.

The situation has necessitated a move to Stage 4 loadshedding across the country.

Eskom says the outages are also due to a loss of additional power generating units in the country.

Eskom Acting Head of Generation, Andrew Etzinger says the power cuts were a result of plant breakdown and loss of imports from Mozambique due to cyclone Idai.

“At the moment, we are implementing Stage 3 loadshedding, but we will need to move to Stage 4 unfortunately from 12 o clock midday. This is as a result of the loss of imports from supplies station in Mozambique. We understand the cyclone which is moving over the country has taken down the transition months between the power station and Eskom which unfortunately meant the loss over 1000 megawatts of capacity.”

People are being advised to check the Eskom or municipality websites for loadshedding schedules.

Stage 4 means loadshedding will occur 12 times over a 4 day period for 2 hours at a time, or over an 8 day period for 4 hours at a time.

South Africans are reacting with anger, fury and disbelief on social media platforms, with some blaming corruption and mismanagement at the power utility for the outages.

Others are outraged as loadshedding has disrupted family functions.

They are just using it as an excuse. Eskom is a failure, we should start asking solar developers to make solar available on contract basis. Let’s all rid ourselves from this @Eskom_SA impostors. Eskom no longer carries the interest of south africa and we can only blame @MYANC

— Wicked Aries (@AriesWicked) March 16, 2019

@koko_matshela was Eskom buying energy from Mozambique when you were at the helm? If so, what would you have done in this instance where Cyclone Idah is causing infrastructure damage?

— Tendai Joe (@Tendaijoe) March 16, 2019

Bloody eskom pic.twitter.com/Su30chsIOj

— BigDawhg??? (@FistosOnLife101) March 16, 2019

says it all the evil darkness of state capture pic.twitter.com/i4qf9L0tjs

— Alistair Francisco (@alistairfran) March 16, 2019