Scepticism mounts over Eskom’s ability to resolve load shedding

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There is widespread doubt about Eskom’s ability to permanently resolve load shedding, especially following the recent return of stage 2 power outages, plunging the country into darkness

On Sunday, the minister of Electricity Dr, Kgosientsho Ramokgopa was optimistic that the national grid will improve this week.

Ramokgopa visited Arnot Power station on Monday much to his disappointment of the power station’s performing under 50% capacity.

The minister cancelled his visit to Duvha power station on Tuesday morning. He is expected to visit more power stations this week in Mpumalanga, to assess the challenges and performance of the power stations.

As power outages continue unabated there is little confidence from the public that Eskom will fix this power crisis. “Load shedding is not going to end, they have been promising that it will end they even appointed a minister of electricity to stabilise the situation but there is no improvement.”

“I think there is still hope but not in the near future because I think the government is greedy they are stealing the money, if the money was there they could use it on maintenance at all the maintenance where did that money go.”

Power stations are not performing at their optimum generation capacity leading to prolonged power outages. While stakeholders are equally concerned the National Union of Mineworkers believe corruption is to blame.

NUM Highveld Gerional Chairperson Malekutu Motubatse says, “In Eskom, everything that is above a million goes to head office but everything that is under a million is approved at a power station level, so they will escalate those components at the price that they know it just within their parameters. For example, if the real price of a motor is 100 000 they can just balloon it to 800 000. We have seen we have evidence and we have raised this issue.”

Some are calling for the Komati Power Station to be restarted. Mpumalanga Young Communist League of SA, Mvangeli Mthimunye says, “In order for the power stations to perform they must re-commission all this union, re-commission Komati Power Station. You can’t switch off other methods and expected maximum production while you have to switch off other methods.”