In October 2022, strikes staged by members of South Africa’s port and rail operator Transnet heavily disrupted its ports. Clearing the backlog of containers took longer than anticipated after an agreement was reached to grant workers their demands.

The Port of Cape Town is now facing new container backlog issues, but for different reasons.

Around mid-February, the country witnessed strong winds that led to delays in port operations at its container terminals. Local media outlets, however, continued to report on the backlog even weeks after the severe weather conditions.

According to South Africa’s Freight News, several port users raised concerns that the backlogs had not been effectively dealt with by port operator Transnet Port Terminals (TPT).

Trucks around the port have to queue up to 26 hours to deliver or pick up containers, reported Freight News. It added that some fruit exporters decided to divert their cargo to Port Elizabeth due to the lack of reefer plugs at Cape Town.

In response to the complaints, TPT commented, “the inclement weather resulted in the terminal not being fully operational for 4.5 days, losing up to 108 man working hours in that period.”

Meanwhile, port users claimed that the equipment and cranes at the port were “not adequately maintained." One port user told Freight News, “The RTGs are not maintained properly and have not been replaced where necessary, so if you don’t have enough RTGs to work across all three berths, one berth becomes like a parking berth and the truckers are not moving.”

Nevertheless, the port operator assured the public that it continues to deploy new equipment at the port to clear the backlog as fast as possible.

A statement by TPT on Friday, 24 February, assured, “collaborative engagements with stakeholders and customers have been intensified as the terminal continues to face disruptive weather. The Cape Town Terminal remains fully committed to moving customer cargo as efficiently as possible.”