President Cyril Ramaphosa has ordered army personnel to be stationed at power stations as theft and sabotage adds to the inability of state-owned utility Eskom to meet electricity demand.
A total of 880 members of the South African National Defence Force will be deployed at stations around the country until 17 October, presidential spokesman Vincent Magwenya said in a statement on Saturday. Some 2 700 members were previously deployed from 17 March to 17 April.
Former Eskom CEO André de Ruyter estimated the amount of money that’s being stolen from Eskom at R1-billion/month.
Electricity minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa in April announced plans, to be implemented over the next six months, to limit power cuts that have crippled South Africa — included addressing criminality and reducing infrastructure sabotage at Eskom.
Eskom is cutting up to 5GW of power generating capacity from the nation’s grid on Saturday due to the further breakdown of generating units.
On Friday, the high court ruled that all government hospitals and clinics, state schools and the country’s police buildings should be spared from power cuts.
Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan must “take all reasonable steps within 60 days” to prevent interruption of electricity supply due to rotational blackouts implemented Eskom, according to a ruling by three judges from the court in Pretoria. — (c) 2023 Bloomberg LP