By Murray Willaims, Boyd Webb and Sivuyile Mangxamb
The mayor of Cape Town and the national ANC, in rare agreement, have called on the government to come clean on Eskom's latest blackouts.
Electricity cuts shut down suburbs and towns across the Cape on Thursday as Eskom went into emergency mode to control the effects of a national power shortage.
Mayor Helen Zille said on Friday: "We have the sense that Eskom and the minister (Public Enterprises head Alec Erwin) are not levelling with us. Mayco was assured last year by Eskom chief executive Thulani Gcabashe that the problems were over."
'Right to call Erwin to account for whether Eskom was capable of managing such a critical resource' Zille was referring to the rolling blackouts that hit the Cape last year. She said the problems were clearly not over.
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Zille said the public had a right to call Erwin to account for whether Eskom was capable of managing such a critical resource.
The ANC, in turn, has demanded that the government investigate circumstances surrounding yesterday's power cuts.
Describing the blackouts as "unfortunate", ANC secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe said the party would call on the government to look into the matter.
"We hope … it will be able to develop contingency plans so that in future it will have back-up systems," he said.
'Time Eskom was punished for the blackouts' The ID said it was time Eskom was punished for the blackouts.
"Some form of punitive action needs to be meted out in the form of fines, which can be used to compensate small businesses which are often left to bear the brunt of Eskom's incompetence," ID MP Lance Greyling said.
DA MP Hendrik Schmidt said the blackouts had serious economic repercussions. The party would be submitting a parliamentary question demanding an explanation for the shortages and why the public had not been given notice of the shutdowns.
The Freedom Front Plus has called on the National Assembly's Portfolio Committee on Minerals and Energy to get Eskom to account for the electricity crisis.
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