The government of Egypt has increased daily power outages to three hours on Sunday and Monday, which is one hour longer than usual, due to a surge in domestic electricity usage caused by a heatwave.
This is in response to a situation where gas production has decreased, demand for electricity has risen, and there is a shortage of foreign currency. Since July last year, most areas have been experiencing scheduled two-hour daily power cuts.
Earlier this month, temporary shutdowns at fertiliser and chemical plants were caused by a shortage of gas supplies.
These power cuts first started last summer when the demand for air conditioning increased, which has caused frustration among citizens and disruptions for businesses. There have also been several reported deaths attributed to the blackouts.
A saxophonist named Mohammed Ali Nasr tragically fell to his death earlier this month in an elevator shaft in the coastal city of Alexandria. He was trapped in the elevator during a power cut and couldn’t escape, as his brother told a local TV show.
Reestablishing and increasing power supplies was presented as one of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s accomplishments in the years following his leadership of the ousting of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Mursi in 2013.
Officials have attributed power cuts to the growing demand from a population of 106 million and ongoing development projects.
Since the onset of power cuts, some Egyptians have been reposting or criticising official posts from previous years about improved power supplies. Interestingly, some of these posts were subsequently deleted.