The City of Johannesburg says it will meet with Electricity Minister, Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, and power utility Eskom today in an attempt to resolve its debt issue.
The problem has led to the power utility threatening to interrupt electricity supply to the metro.
In a statement, Eskom says the City of Joburg and City Power owe it an an amount of R4.9 billion, excluding the current account of a further R1.4 billion which is due and payable at the end of November 2024.
Eskom serves notice of power interruption against City of Johannesburg and City Power. pic.twitter.com/M5BdQpgHFz
— Eskom Hld SOC Ltd (@Eskom_SA) November 7, 2024
Meanwhile, the Johannesburg Chamber of Commerce and Industry says businesses in the city are at risk of having their operations disrupted and this could lead to losses.
The chamber’s CEO, Bernadette Zeiler says, “That would impact the manufacturing process once the production process has started and there is load shedding, they can’t continue the process from where they stopped. They would have to go right to the beginning, so it’s all that material, equipment wasted. It’s very costly and it will cause businesses to close and it will really increase the rate of unemployment as well.”
