Seen from space at night, South Africa is a country veined with light – the product of an electricity network on which large sums have been lavished. The lights fade at the country’s borders, as do its wide highways, tall buildings and modern tele­communications grid. Superior infrastructure sets it apart from the rest of the continent more noticeably than anything else.

Eskom, the state-owned power utility, boasted of that superiority when it built Megawatt Park, its Johannesburg headquarters, in the 1970s. The lights at Mega­watt Park were never turned off. Commanding one of the city’s highest points, the building was a glowing beacon reminding its customers that Eskom could be relied on to provide cheap, abundant electricity.