Parliament Apologises For Power Outage During Budget Presentation
The Parliament of Zimbabwe has issued an apology to President Emmerson Mnangagwa following a power outage on Thursday after the 2025 National Budget presentation at the New Parliament Building in Mt Hampden.
The outage quickly became the subject of jokes and ridicule on social media, with many attributing it to the ongoing load shedding that has left businesses and households without electricity for over 18 hours daily.
Some social media users took delight in the fact that the power failure had affected the country’s leadership.
However, Parliament clarified in a statement that the power disruption was caused by thunderstorms and high winds, which affected overhead lines.
This led to tripping at a 132kV feeder that supplies power to a substation, which in turn powers the Mt Hampden area.
After consulting with onsite personnel and the Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC), Parliament confirmed that this was the cause of the power loss to the New Parliament Building and nearby areas at 15:25.
The backup generator at the building was also impacted by the power surge, causing it to lose its memory settings and fail to switch on automatically.
However, power was restored within five minutes after the generator was manually reset.
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