After a weekend of no power outages, South Africans are anticipating load-shedding after Eskom announced on Monday its system was under pressure.

The power utility urged the public to save power by switching off non-essential appliances. 

“Our power system is under severe pressure. Please switch off all unnecessary lights, your geyser, pool pump, and non-essential appliances,” it said. 

Eskom had not responded to questions sent by TimesLIVE at the time of publishing. The article will be updated to reflect its comment once it is received. 

South Africans experienced various stages of load-shedding last week due to a constrained power system.

The power utility ramped up load-shedding to stage 4 last Wednesday after the Medupi, Kusile and Matla power stations tripped and a unit each at the Lethabo and Arnot stations were shut down.

Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan briefed the media last week on the state of the power utility and announced load-shedding would be suspended over the weekend ahead of Monday’s local government elections. 

Gordhan said Eskom’s poor electricity supply demonstrated a need for expertise at the power utility and called on the company’s board to acquire the necessary skills to tackle load-shedding. 

“It is quite clear within Eskom itself, expertise is required and the board has been instructed to take whatever measures necessary to bring in the necessary expertise to back up and ensure the proper level of professionalism and engineering rigour is applied within the Eskom environment,” he said.