President Cyril Ramaphosa has deployed members of the South African National Defence Force at several Eskom power stations.
This comes at the time the country was affected by power cuts with Stage 6 being implemented by the power utility.
The government and Eskom top officials have over the last few months been complaining about sabotage at its power plants and the supply of sub standard coal by contractors.
Eskom confirmed that the members of the SANDF have been deployed at four power stations in Mpumalanga.
“Eskom can confirm that the SANDF is being deployed at Eskom. Eskom has received deployments at four sites this afternoon, Majuba, Camden, Grootvlei and Tutuka power stations,” said the power utility.
The deployment of the army at Eskom comes during the week of high drama where CEO Andre de Ruyter quit from his position.
He had been at the helm over the last few years.
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana and Ramaphosa had in the past stated that Eskom was the financial risk to the economy and it needed to be supported.
Businesses and households have been complaining about load shedding with billions of rands lost in the economy.
In his political report on Friday at the ANC national elective conference Ramaphosa said emergency power was needed to deal with load shedding.
IOL