Concern over power cut in oThongathi

050910 Electricity pylons carry power from Cape Town's Koeberg nuclear power plant July 17, 2009. South Africa will need 20 gigawatts (GW) of new power generation capacity by 2020 and would require double that amount a decade later to meet rising demand, the country's power utility said September 7, 2009. Picture taken July 17, 2009. REUTERS/Mike Hutchings (SOUTH AFRICA ENERGY BUSINESS)

050910 Electricity pylons carry power from Cape Town's Koeberg nuclear power plant July 17, 2009. South Africa will need 20 gigawatts (GW) of new power generation capacity by 2020 and would require double that amount a decade later to meet rising demand, the country's power utility said September 7, 2009. Picture taken July 17, 2009. REUTERS/Mike Hutchings (SOUTH AFRICA ENERGY BUSINESS)

Published Nov 23, 2012

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KwaZulu-Natal - The oThongathi (Tongaat) town centre and surrounding residential areas have had power disruptions since Wednesday morning.

AR Ganie, vice-chairman of the Tongaat Business Forum, said the town centre had its first power cut at 10am on Wednesday.

“One section of town got power back at about 1pm on Wednesday, and another section at about 4pm, while a third section got power at about 3am yesterday,” he said.

“But now the whole town is out again,” he said last night.

Ganie said all the banks in the town had to be closed on Wednesday, and had not reopened yesterday.

“My concern is that if the banks remain closed, no one will have any money,” he said.

Residents said power had not been restored by Friday morning.

Ward Councillor, Michael Abraham, said the outage was caused by a voltage fault, which had damaged the five mini-sub-stations in the area.

“The municipality had a team of people working all Wednesday night,” he said.

“They are trying to get power back to the CBD first.”

Abraham said he commended the efforts of the municipality.

“Power outages can’t be predicted, especially when there is bad weather. There was no negligence on the part of the municipality,” he said. - Daily News

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