SA is set to enter a second week of intense power cuts, with state-owned power utility Eskom warning it could take several weeks to recover from last week’s wildcat strike, which prevented up to 90% of staff going to work at some plants.
The industrial action, which unions say they did not sanction, forced Eskom to implement stage 6 load-shedding last Tuesday for the first time since 2019, and revert to stage 4 only at the weekend. During stage 6, Eskom sheds 6,000MW from the national grid and customers are without electricity for up to 10 hours out of every 24.
Eskom has been implementing power cuts regularly since the beginning of the year as it struggles to maintain its ageing fleet, but the situation worsened dramatically after wage talks deadlocked and workers went on an unlawful strike.
In a statement released on Sunday, the utility said it would implement stage 6 load-shedding on Monday afternoon, with varying degrees of cuts throughout the week, depending on the extent to which employees return to work on Monday.
With a full workforce, it would gradually lower load-shedding to stage 2 by the weekend, it said.
“With the exception of Matla [power station], there has been a marked increase in employees returning to work during the weekend. We expect all workers to return this week as the wage negotiations get resolved,” Eskom spokesperson Sikonathi Mantshantsha said.
Asked whether Eskom had sufficient diesel to run its open cycle gas turbine power plants, Mantshantsha said: “Eskom continues receiving all fuel supplies as planned and has used this period to replenish to satisfactory levels.”
Wage talks between Eskom and unions were expected to resume on Tuesday.
Eskom CEO André de Ruyter said on Friday that about half of SA’s power outages last week were due to the strike. Eskom staff are classified as essential workers and are ostensibly prohibited from striking.
While management’s focus is on stabilising the power grid and bringing broken-down generation units back online, the utility will nevertheless take disciplinary action against workers who stayed away unlawfully.
All alleged acts of intimidation will be investigated, De Ruyter said, referring to reports that the homes of some senior Eskom officials were torched by striking workers and that non-strikers were prevented from entering power plants. Criminal acts will be reported to the SA Police Service to investigate, while other offences will be investigated internally, De Ruyter said.
COO Jan Oberholzer said if it were not for the strike, SA would be on level 3 load-shedding. He said there was no imminent risk of a national blackout.
“We must reduce demand to match available capacity by load-shedding pre-emptively.”
When Eskom goes to stage 6 load-shedding, “from a customer perspective, it may seem as if the system is at risk of a total blackout, but because we are implementing load-shedding [as needed], the system continues to function”, he said.
Eskom head of generation Rhulani Mathebula said management had not detected any evidence of sabotage during the strike, but some employees who had reported for duty had their personal property damaged.
Maintenance was not being done at most plants, causing “defects that are not being addressed [which can lead to] major failures that will take some time to fix”, he said.
Eskom said it would implement stage 4 from 5am to 4pm on Monday, and move to stage 6 until 10pm. It will drop back to stage 4 until midnight, and down to stage 2 between midnight and 5am. The pattern would be repeated on Tuesday.
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