‘We hope this is not part of stop the count panic’: Floyd Shivambu responds to Eskom troubles

EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu slammed the announcement by Eskom about its system being under severe pressure, saying the party hopes the power cuts are not part of the “stop the count panic” as results from the local government elections stream in.

He said all results operation centres (ROCs) must have backup generators to prevent any disruptions in the vote-counting process. 

Eskom implemented stage 2 load-shedding on Tuesday afternoon after a generation unit at the Kusile power station tripped, putting the system further under pressure. It had said earlier that while  a unit each at Camden, Kendal and Medupi power stations had been returned, twogeneration units, one at Arnot and another at Hendrina tripped, while a unit each at Arnot and Lethabo were forced to shut down.

Shivambu’s insinuation that the power utility was part of the “stop the count” panic was met with mixed response.

Eskom had suspended load-shedding on Friday last week in the lead-up to the local government elections.

Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan said last week the Electoral Commission had been provided with lighting equipment to be used at voting stations that do not fall under Eskom to prevent interruptions that could result from power outages.

Before the minister’s address, IEC chairperson Glen Mashinini had assured the public the elections would not be rigged, saying the commission had put measures in place to ensure transparency.

He said this after EFF leader Julius Malema raised concerns about possible vote-rigging in Monday’s poll. Malema had claimed the reintroduction of load-shedding was part of a well-orchestrated plan to steal votes from smaller parties.