More than 15 000 South Africans have objected to a proposed electricity price surge. With consumers often finding themselves with more month than money, the hike will cause greater distress if it comes into effect next year.
A petition started by the Democratic Alliance (DA) quickly gained traction as most simply cannot afford to fork out more cash to keep the lights on. Now, Parliament is set to debate the 36.15% surge.
“The fact that we are in the government of national unity does not take away our responsibility to still look after the people. In actual fact, it makes that responsibility far greater,” said DA spokesperson Willie Aucamp in an interview with Newzroom Afrika.
The proposed tariff increase is meant to allow Eskom to recover R8 billion to cover revenue shortfalls from previous years. Adding to Eskom’s woes was reduced demand as independent power producers came online.
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Independent producers
Speaking in an interview with Salaamedia on Tuesday, community activist at GroundWork, Thomas Mnguni, claimed the surge in private power production was to blame for the proposed tariff increase.
“We’ve had a lot of independent power producers coming online. We’ve had a lot of industries generating their own electricity. Therefore, as much as Eskom might be generating electricity most of that electricity does not go into the market and that means Eskom is spending a lot of money on generating electricity which they cannot sell. This clawback process is meant to recover that,” he said.
However, Aucamp was of the view that opening up the market was bound to have the opposite effect.
“We are firmly of the opinion that the electricity market needs to be opened up to the private sector to also form part of it. We believe that competition will be a good thing firstly to increase the capabilities of companies, but also to decrease price,” he argued.
As things stood, another tariff increase would further burden cash-strapped consumers.
“If there’s an increase of 40% in electricity, there’s a lot of people that will not be able to afford that. If you are currently paying R1000 per month for electricity, which is not a lot, you will in future pay R1400 for that electricity,” he said.
Image via Pakistan Point.
