Zimbabwe parliament hit by power cut during budget speech

By BBC News

HARARE: A power cut plunged Zimbabwe’s parliament into darkness as Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube was finishing his budget speech.

The lights flickered and died, leaving top officials like President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga and members of parliament sitting in the dark.

The outage is a symptom of Zimbabwe’s ongoing crisis, with daily 12-hour blackouts driven by a prolonged drought that is crippling energy generation at the Kariba Dam, the country’s main power source.

As the lights went out, opposition MPs shouted that the outage was an apt metaphor for the country’s state of affairs.

George Manyaya, a spokesperson from Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (Zesa) told local news site ZimLive that the blackout had not been planned.

He said parliament had its own dedicated electricity supply which is exempt from power cuts.

He said the blackout had happened because of a lightning strike.

Before the lights went out, Ncube said the agricultural sector would contract by 15% this year because of the drought.

He, however, projected that the economy would grow by 6% next year due to the forecast of above-average rainfall – which would also serve to improve the supply of electricity.