There have been close to 2 000 power outages in Johannesburg since Friday as a result of downpours.

According to City of Johannesburg acting MMC for Environment and Infrastructure Services Leah Knott, City Power has dealt with 1 944 outages across Johannesburg since Friday. Of those, 260 were related to the Hursthill substation.

"City Power is dealing with an abnormal number of breakdowns as Johannesburg residents consumed more power to deal with the cold and wet weather," Knott said.

The City is "closely monitoring outage backlogs" according to Knott, and more technicians and contractors have been deployed to deal with the crisis as fast as possible.

"City Power has indicated the outages have been mainly caused by the surge in demand, which has led to cable faults and infrastructure failures on the City's aged power grid. Rampant cable theft has further complicated the situation, with City Power personnel too being under sustained attack from these criminals on almost a daily basis," said Knott.

Load-shedding implemented by Eskom on Monday night saw the process of restoring power further delayed, said Knott. Technicians are unable to work on the network during load-shedding.

"The unfortunate fact is that Johannesburg's power network is aged and in need of constant maintenance and support to keep functioning at an optimum capacity. It is during times like this that City Power also has to deal with surges on their network as demand increases," Knott added.

"We thus appeal to all residents in our city to always use electricity sparingly. Everyone can play their role in preventing outages by only using appliances when absolutely necessary and turning off their geysers and pool pumps until the backlog is dealt with."

In a statement on Tuesday night, City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena said the City's Reuven Service Delivery Centre had been under tremendous pressure, with more than 400 calls logged.

"The outages are caused by, among others, cable theft, multiple cable faults due to the rain, overloading due to cold weather and the effects of load shedding," he said.

He said teams were investigating repairs and "trying to address the backlog".

"We are aware of the inconvenience this is causing to the customers, and we appeal for patience and cooperation as the technicians work to locate faults, replace the stolen cables, and do the repairs," said Mangena.