Eskom on Sunday said it hoped that it would not need to implement load shedding in the upcoming week.

“For now, our aspiration is not to have load shedding at all [for the week ahead],” said Eskom spokesman Khulu Phasiwe.

However, he warned, that the possibility could not be ruled out entirely: “Because we are running an old system, we do experience technical faults from time to time.”

Phasiwe said that it was normal for there to be outages at “one or two stations due to various technical situations,” but said that at the moment there were no dire incidents.

He said that the power system was “relatively stable” on Sunday afternoon.

This week, Eskom CEO Tshediso Matona reiterated that the country’s power supply would remain severely constrained in the coming months while Eskom dealt with its maintenance backlog.

He likened Eskom to “a ship sailing through difficult waters” and a car that had not had regular maintenance.

In February 900 megawatts is to be taken off the grid when one of Koeberg nuclear power station’s units undergoes maintenance.

Meanwhile, on Sunday, Democratic Alliance MP Natasha Michael said she had received reports that Unit 6 at the Medupi power station in Limpopo was “not working as it should…

“It is believed that there is a huge problem with the design of the piping and as a result it will not operate correctly,” she said.

The process of getting the Medupi power station operational has been hit by a number of delays over the last few months.

“South Africans need Medupi to be brought online without delay, but the method must also be sustainable in the long-term.”

Michael said she had written to Public Enterprises Minister Lynne Brown for clarity on the matter. SAPA