As South African brace for what Eskom called a “difficult winter” with stage 8 load shedding highly likely, deputy President Paul Mashatile said the issue of the deliberate power cuts is government’s top priority.
Mashatile made the remarks on Thursday, during an oversight visit to the KwaZulu-Natal.
The deputy president’s assurances come amid a warning by Eskom that South Africans should brace for a grim and tough winter with the deliberate power cuts expected to reach stage 8.
Stage 8 load shedding
On Thursday, acting Eskom CEO Calib Cassim warned that the utility had 3 000MW less power this winter than it did last winter.
“If the interventions that we have planned for the winter do not achieve the desired outcomes and your unplanned outages reaches levels of 18 000MW, then the likelihood of stage 8 load shedding during peaks is extremely high.”
ALSO READ: ‘Stage 8 load shedding likely in winter’ – Eskom
Keeping the lights on
Mashatile said government is hard at work to ensure that the “lights stay on”.
“Government is determined to keep the lights on and as a result, apart from appointing the minister of electricity, we have announced that we are now embarking on procuring emergency power,” he told EWN.
Load shedding to end in 2023?
Mashatile’s comments were echoed by African National Congress (ANC) secretary-general Fikile Mbalula earlier this week, when he claimed that government would end the deliberate power cuts by the end of this year.
This is despite recent remarks by Minister of Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, who expressed doubts about the possibility of resolving load shedding by the end of the year.
However, Mbalula was adamant that the rolling blackouts would be a thing of the past.
“I know from where I’m sitting [and] from the work that is being done by government and ministers and so on, [that] before the end of the year, load shedding should be something of the past…
“I can assure that load shedding will be reversed and it will be dealt with decisively,” Mbalula said during an interview with eNCA’s Power to Truth with JJ Tabane.
Additional reporting by Thapelo Lekabe
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