South Africans may need to brace themselves for additional power cuts as protests continue at nine of Eskom’s power stations.
On Friday, 24 June, the power utility announced it would be ramping up load shedding to stage 4 from 11:00am today until midnight, and again over the weekend from 5:00am to midnight amid ongoing unprotected labour action.
Employees at Eskom are currently on an unprotected strike over salaries after negotiations stalled earlier this week, as per EWN.
“These protests included incidents of intimidation of working employees and blockading of roads leading to power stations and other facilities, inhibiting the free flow of personnel and commodities required for the generation of electricity and smooth operations,” Eskom said in a statement.
According to the power utility, the bolstering of emergency generation reserves was required to react to unforeseen circumstances, as well as to replenish emergency reserves to prepare for the week ahead.
Eskom urged striking employees to put the South African people first and to “respect the law and to desist from illegal and undemocratic conduct.”
According to News24, Nusma claims talks between parties collapsed because Eskom refused to be held accountable for its spending on coal and independent Power Producer contracts.
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