Joburg Water has urged residents to grant its workers access to their properties for purposes of pairing open meters with Customer Interface Units. Picture: Supplied
As Eskom implements stage 6 load to avoid a possible collapse of the electricity grid, the exacerbated and deliberate power cuts have affected services including water supply.
On Sunday, Johannesburg Water issued a warning to residents in the south of Johannesburg about water supply.
“Due to high demand in Lenasia High Level and Hospital Hill Res; Outlets will be closed at 1pm to build capacity and open at 5pm.”
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It said stage 6 load shedding was impacting Johannesburg Water infrastructure towers in various parts of the City of Johannesburg.
“The pump stations which supply water into the towers, are isolated during the electricity outage, which then results in no water supply into the towers during the duration of loadshedding. Customers in the various tower zones are affected by no water or poor pressure.”
“Johannesburg Water is monitoring affected infrastructure and is ensuring that water supply is restored as soon as possible to customers. Johannesburg Water appeals to customers to reduce consumption during this time,” it said.
Speaking to The Citizen, ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba said South Africans were tired of load shedding.
“This load shedding matter, honestly as South Africans, I really totally gatvol. We’ve just now come to learn that people in the south of Johannesburg are going to be deprived of water because of this load shedding.”
“Load shedding created by this ANC government since literally 2004. They worked out with the expansion of the electricity grid throughout, which was a good thing to do. But at the same time, the source of the electricity which is Eskom, they went on a looting spree,” Mashaba said.
Meanwhile, Eskom chief operating officer Jan Oberholzer said stage 6 load shedding is planned for Monday, with heavy rolling blackouts expected for the week.
He said stage 6 load shedding will remain implemented until sufficient generating units are returned to service.
“We can’t make firm commitment as to when we can ease current stage of load shedding. We may be able to go to Stage 5 at 17:00 on Sunday depending on units returning to service.”
“We may still require stage 6 load shedding on Monday to protect emergency reserves. We will definitely have a high stage of load shedding this week,” Oberholzer said.
ALSO READ: Eskom: ‘We are trying to avoid a total system collapse’
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