Egyptians brace for dark summer despite authorities' pledge to solve power cuts

When a power cut took Egypt's state TV channels off air for close to an hour last week — for the first time since the Soviet-era Maspero building which houses state broadcasters was opened in 1960 — Egyptians responded with humour.

“Who found out that the power was out in Maspero? Is there really anyone who watches Egyptian [state] television anymore?” read one popular tweet by a user named Tarek Amr.

Egypt has for years suffered from a worsening energy crunch prompted by fuel shortages, with frequent power outages, particularly in the summer when national consumption spikes by almost a tenth due to air-conditioning usage, say officials.

Although the jury is still out on the cause of the Maspero blackout, with different departments blaming one another, creeping power cuts ahead of the summer and the fasting month of Ramadan are no laughing matter in the Arab world’s most populous country.

Already, local media is rife with reports of hours-long outages in impoverished provinces in Upper Egypt, in the governorate of Menoufia which is north-west of the capital, and in Cairo itself, as Egyptians nervously anticipate what the coming months will bring.