Brace for load shedding resurgence after elections, warns Malema

Julius Malema

Cape Town – EFF leader Julius Malema has predicted a return of rolling blackouts in South Africa as soon as election vote counting begins on May 29th.

Malem was speaking to attendees at an EFF town-hall meeting in Lenasia, south of Johannesburg, on Saturday.

According to EWN, he said that load shedding was “man-made”.

He asserted that the absence of load shedding during events like the Rugby World Cup suggested a deliberate manipulation of power outages.

Malema alleged that the blackouts during elections were orchestrated to facilitate electoral fraud, citing past incidents in Gauteng.

“They want us to count in darkness so that they can steal elections, the same way they did here in Gauteng,” the report quoted him as saying.

Meanwhile,Eskom said on Sunday that South Africa will remain free from power cuts as load shedding remained suspended indefinitely. This marked the longest period without load shedding in 2024, lasting 18 consecutive days.

The absence of severe outages, with most incidents limited to Stage 1 and 2, indicated an improvement over the previous year.

Eskom attributed the suspension to sustained generation capacity and emergency reserves at its power stations.

“After 18 consecutive days of no load shedding, it will remain suspended until further notice. This positive development is attributed to the sustained availability of generation capacity and emergency reserves.

“A total of 2 150MW of generation capacity is planned to be restored by Monday. Eskom will provide an update on Wednesday afternoon or promptly communicate any significant changes ahould they occur,” the power utility said on Sunday.

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Compiled by Betha Madhomu

Article written by