As South Africa continues to endure rolling blackouts, the Presidency said President Cyril Ramaphosa continues to have faith in the management of the failing parastatal.
This comes after Eskom ramped up the deliberate power cuts to stage 4 from stage 2 on Tuesday, until further notice.
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Ramaphosa’s faith in Eskom
Briefing the media in Pretoria, Presidential spokesperson Vincent Magwenya said the issues affecting Eskom are complex.
“The President still has faith in the management and leadership of Eskom. It will not be prudent to single out an individual at this stage, considering and appreciating the complexity of issues at Eskom, as they’ve been outlined multiple times before.”
“The President has confidence that with the appointment of the new board, the executive management team at Eskom, will have the necessary support strategically,” said Mangwanya.
Eskom board
Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan last month announced that Mpho Makwana had been appointed as new chairperson of the Eskom board.
Gordhan said the incoming board must deal with the current load shedding issues, procurement, elimination of corruption and ensuring that there is reliable energy supply in the medium to long term.
“This board is the accounting authority – it is responsible for evaluating the current performance of Eskom, and to account to the shareholder, which is the Department of Public Enterprises.”
Who’s to blame?
While Ramaphosa said it will not be prudent to single out an individual for Eskom’s woes, Gordhan also made it clear that the African National Congress (ANC) was not to blame and load shedding is not the party’s fault.
“In 1983 under a different government, we had load shedding which led to a decision to build several power stations which were eventually completed in the early 1990s, and are still problematic so not everything is the fault of the ANC.”
He said rolling blackouts stemmed back from the 1980s and the deliberate power cuts would continue for at least another nine to twelve months.
“So, to be frank to the South African public as the government has said repeatedly, we could still have load shedding for another nine to twelve months,” Gordhan said.
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