South Africa intensifies power outages
Eskom claims that it cannot raise its wage bill because it depends on government bailouts to keep the lights on.
Boakyewaa Lawrencia 
To prevent a catastrophic grid breakdown, South Africa's scheduled power cutbacks are being extended to up to six hours every day.
These new forced blackouts, or load shedding as it is known in the nation, are being blamed on the country's primary power firm Eskom's striking employees who are demanding a 10% salary increase.
Eskom claims that it cannot raise its wage bill because it depends on government bailouts to keep the lights on.
As a result, the blackouts will start on Tuesday evening for five hours and continue until Wednesday evening.
The most industrialized nation on the continent is South Africa, and this interruption to homes and businesses occurs amid the chilly winter in the Southern Hemisphere.
Eskom's problems emanate from a $26bn (£21bn) debt burden, along with an old and failing grid. It did recently build two new power stations but both have design flaws and are unable to provide power constantly.
