{"id":7609,"date":"2024-11-29T07:52:51","date_gmt":"2024-11-29T07:52:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diamondtvzambia.com\/?p=7609"},"modified":"2024-11-29T07:52:51","modified_gmt":"2024-11-29T07:52:51","slug":"zimbabwe-parliament-hit-by-power-cut-during-budget-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diamondtvzambia.com\/staging\/7839\/zimbabwe-parliament-hit-by-power-cut-during-budget-speech\/","title":{"rendered":"ZIMBABWE PARLIAMENT HIT BY POWER CUT DURING BUDGET SPEECH"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A power cut plunged Zimbabwe’s parliament into darkness as Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube was finishing his budget speech.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>The lights flickered and died, leaving top officials like President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga and members of parliament sitting in the dark.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The outage is a symptom of Zimbabwe\u2019s ongoing crisis, with daily 12-hour blackouts driven by a prolonged drought that is crippling energy generation at the Kariba Dam, the country\u2019s main power source.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the lights went out, opposition MPs shouted that the outage was an apt metaphor for the country\u2019s state of affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

He said parliament had its own dedicated electricity supply which is exempt from power cuts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said the blackout had happened because of a lightning strike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before the lights went out, Ncube said the agricultural sector would contract by 15% this year because of the drought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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. [BBC News]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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\u2019s ongoing crisis, with daily 12-hour blackouts driven …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7611,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","content-type":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t