POLL | Do you believe Eskom will keep its promise of no load-shedding during the elections?

26 October 2021 - 13:30
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Eskom is implementing rotational stage 2 load-shedding until Saturday. Stock photo.
Eskom is implementing rotational stage 2 load-shedding until Saturday. Stock photo.
Image: 123RF/Choneschones

Will Eskom keep its promise and give South Africans a break from load-shedding on Monday? This is one of the pertinent questions being asked by many as the local government elections loom.

The Election Commission (IEC) is gearing up for special votes on Saturday and Sunday ahead of the official election day on November 1. 

Eskom COO Jan Oberholzer told a media briefing on Monday he expects the power utility to have enough generation capacity, and the power utility is working with the election commission to ensure there aren't disruptions to the vote-counting process. 

“Our distribution colleagues are working closely with the IEC to make sure that electricity will be available. I have spoken to the generation, transmission and distribution colleagues to be on standby from the end of this week until after the voting has taken place to make sure that wherever we do have challenges, Eskom will assist.

“We have emergency generators available, which will assist wherever we can. We are extremely committed as Eskom to making sure that there are no electricity challenges going through the elections that are around the corner,” he said. 

SA is currently experiencing rotational stage 2 load-shedding which will last until Saturday, Eskom announced on Tuesday morning.

While Eskom teams have successfully returned a unit each at the Kusile, Matimba and Arnot power stations during the early hours of this morning, further delays in returning other units to service have exacerbated the capacity constraints, hampering the ability to replenish the emergency generation reserves,” Eskom said in a statement.


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