Counting the cost of Gauteng power outages

Johannesburg businesses hit hard by cuts

THE lights are back on but Gauteng businesses are just beginning to count the heavy cost of four days of power outages that hit large parts of Johannesburg this week.

The South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry bemoaned what it labelled a delayed response by city officials, who failed to give timely notice of the strike by City Power staff that was behind the blackouts.

The effects of the strike were compounded by the alleged sabotage of substations that wreaked havoc in the traffic and left about 25 suburbs without power — some for as long as 72 hours.

Neren Rau, CEO of the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said businesses would have been in a position to plan for the power outage had they known of the strike ahead of time.

City Power staff stopped work abruptly on Wednesday over unhappiness about a new shift system that the city said was designed to reduce an excessive overtime bill.

On Friday afternoon, a delegation of politicians, including Johannesburg mayor Parks Tau and the MECs for community safety and economic development, Faith Mazibuko and Eric Xayiya, spoke about the crisis.

Mazibuko said that acts of sabotage were ‘‘tantamount to terrorism”. The police’s Crime Intelligence Unit, State Security and the Hawks had been brought in to investigate the alleged sabotage, which put lives at risk and brought South Africa’s economic hub to a virtual standstill, she said.

Tau said the cuts on overtime for City Power employees were necessary because the city was spending R213-million a year on overtime.

“A situation where somebody who earns an average of R400 000 per annum gets overtime pay of more than R1.2-million per annum is an anomaly. An organisation that does not intervene is actually encouraging inefficiencies.”

Xayiya said that the economic impact of the outage could not yet be estimated.

“If you have a day and a half where you have the stock exchange not operational, you

An organisation that does not intervene is encouraging inefficiencies

are not just impacting on Gauteng and the city itself. ”

He said it also affected the city’s international reputation and investor confidence.

In 2008 it was estimated by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa that planned power cuts by Eskom cost the economy R50-billion.

City Power’s managing director, Sicelo Xulu, said about 80% of the outages, particularly in “areas of impact” such as Northcliff and Roodepoort — where substations also power water reservoirs — were as a result of sabotage.

He said the city had managed to restore power in these areas.

City Power confirmed that Houghton, the suburb in which former president Nelson Mandela lives, was the only suburb that had been temporarily supplied with a generator during the outage.

Mandela was discharged from the Mediclinic Heart Hospital in Pretoria last Sunday to recuperate at home after a lengthy stay for a recurring lung infection.

Presidency spokesman Mac Maharaj said he had not been affected by the power cuts.

“His place [home] has been reconfigured to deal with a person in intensive care. So there were standby facilities available and no problems,” Maharaj said.

City Power said the last of the affected areas were back up by noon yesterday.

Meanwhile, businesses at Cresta shopping centre, west of the city, suffered loss of earnings over two days as they were plunged into darkness. Fast-food outlets at the mall said they had lost significant amounts.

An employee at The Fish & Chip Co said: ‘‘We had to throw away the fish because it was starting to smell because the freezers were defrosting.”

Spur at Cresta said the twoday power outage had caused losses of R60 000. Piatto Mediterranean Kitchen said it had lost about R30 000.

The general manager and part owner of Plaka restaurant, Nishall Iswarlall, said: “We suffered big losses over this period — approximately R100 000 including loss of turnover and stock.”

Johannesburg Chamber of Commerce CEO Joan Warburton-McBride said the power cuts would have a substantial effect on smaller businesses without access to generators.