Electricity was restored to Cape Town on Wednesday afternoon, after a power cut in the city late in the morning, Eskom said.
“The outage lasted from just before 11am to just before midday, and affected the 1/8central business district 3/8, as well as parts of the northern and southern suburbs,” said Eskom spokeswoman Hillary Joffe.
She said the power failure was caused by a trip on the line supplying Cape Town.
Earlier, workers lined the Cape Town's pavements as businesses were plunged into darkness.
“This is an Eskom issue, it is not the city's systems 1/8that caused the outage 3/8,” City of Cape Town spokesman Solly Malatsi said.
“The lights went out at about 11am,” said an office manager while smoking a cigarette on a pavement on Loop Street.
“Someone obviously forgot to pay Eskom something.”
The owner of a fastfood takeaway on Long Street said he switched on his generator when the blackout hit.
“I learned my lesson a few years ago when we had rolling blackouts in the summer,” he said.
“I lost a lot of money. This time I was prepared.”
The city's streets were clogged with traffic at noon with many traffic lights out of action too.
According to News24 reports suburbs across the Cape peninsula were without electricity, including Goodwood, Rondebosch, Parow, Milnerton, Hazendal, Woodstock, Observatory, Plumstead, Newlands, Westlake, Glencairn, Mowbray, Rocklands and Salt River. - Sapa