Electricity cuts crippling local businesses
Thabazimbi – Heads may roll… (if you’re following the Eskom vs President Cyril Ramaphosa’s battle), but is that enough to save our local economy?
“Eskom is really killing us,” President Ramaphosa said earlier this week (26 September) at the Winnie Madikizela-Mandela birthday celebration. In the backdrop of excessive load shedding, Eskom applied for a 32% electricity hike.
On the first day of hearings on Eskom’s tariff application to the National Energy Regulator of SA (Nersa) on Monday 19 September, Eskom’s chief financial officer Calib Cassim said that even if Eskom is relieved of R200 billion in debt, the company will soon be back in the same position if it doesn’t significantly raise tariffs, cut costs, and get people and municipalities to pay their bills.
Eskom is asking for a 32% increase for 2023/24.
“Loadshedding and rolling blackouts are cold comfort to many South Africans, especially small businesses which are supposed to create 90% of the jobs in 2030,” said John Dludlu, SBI CEO.
But let’s hear from our local businessowners…
“We don’t only have to deal with national loadshedding schedules, we also have to deal with unplanned local power cuts,” says Hetta Nortier, owner of His & Hers Hairstylists, in an interview with Platinum Bushvelder.
“It’s really taking its toll on our wallets as we fight to keep our doors open. I run a salon and I don’t have the finances to purchase a generator. The nail technicians are using their power banks to power their nail ovens.
The room where we wax and tint, is pitch black (during the day when the electricity is off), so I can’t do that either.
This is extremely frustrating as a business owner, and I can’t afford to keep on losing money like this. How can one pay rent if this continues?” Nortier asked in desperation.
We also spoke to Nhlane Engineering owner Henry Mdhluli. “We need electricity to use our equipment – especially when drilling or grinding. I don’t have a generator, but at the moment I am losing thousands of rands daily and it affects my business negatively. My operation cannot run without electricity. It’s impossible.”
Electricity outages influence every sphere of our lives. Mediclinic Thabazimbi reports that despite the outages, they operate as per usual – but at a huge cost.
“The power outages do not affect hospital procedures, as we run on solar panels. When the power goes out, we also run on two generators,” said Mediclinic Thabazimbi hospital manager Martjie du Preez.
“Keeping the generators going is a major unplanned expense – and much more expensive than electricity bills,” Du Preez added.
If you also want to comment on how the electricity outages and loadshedding are affecting you, please email news@platinumbushvelder.co.za (when you have electricity!).
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