NATIONAL NEWS - Eskom management is increasingly blaming staff in public for load shedding, but fails to provide the basics for them to keep the lights on, according to trade union Solidarity.
“There are no spares, because there is no money. Staff are trying to improvise and get permission for makeshift plans, but when the pawpaw hits the fan, management turns on them and blame them,” says Tommy Wedderspoon, coordinator for the electrical sector at Solidarity.
He says the morale among Eskom staff is at rock bottom as unions head to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA), where a dispute about Eskom’s “unilateral implementation of salary increases and reduction in benefits” will be heard in December.
Grip tightens
Eskom announced at 12:20pm on Monday that the prevailing Stage 2 load shedding would be intensified to Stage 4 from 1pm, reducing the demand for electricity by 4 000 megawatts (MW). This is expected to continue until 5am on Friday when it will revert to Stage 2 for another 24 hours.
Stage 4 load shedding leaves households and businesses without electricity for two and a half hours at a time up to three times day, which results in traffic jams as traffic lights stop working, causes disruptions in the workplace, and leaves students preparing for matric and other exams in the dark.
South Africa has been suffering rolling blackouts on and off since October 23, with a break on November 1 when the country went to the polls for municipal elections. This is the second time since then that it has escalated to Stage 4.
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During a hastily convened press briefing before the elections Eskom CEO André de Ruyter said the load shedding at that stage was a deliberate step to build up emergency reserves ahead of the polls, so that the elections would not be disrupted by load shedding.
