Small wonder that President Cyril Ramaphosa’s New Year’s address was brief and subdued, with nary a mention of the elephant rampaging around the room, namely Eskom.

“Just as the strongest steel is forged in fire, just as diamonds are forged deep inside the earth’s crust under the most extreme pressure, let us turn adversity into opportunity,” Ramaphosa said. Yet, aside from diesel dealers or those involved in the production and sale of generators and solar panels — not to mention travel agents specialising in one-way tickets to Perth — it is hard to see how rolling blackouts can be turned into an opportunity.

And that is where it stands. Eskom managed to keep the lights on during the festive season, which coincides with the summer solstice when the combination of the planet’s orbit and an economy that is all but shut down contrive to push power demand to ultra-low levels. In the middle of summer, does anyone even use a hairdryer? But the economy had hardly started the process of rebooting when Eskom announced Stage 2 load shedding on the fourth day of the year, a Saturday no less. That remained the case throughout Sunday and as we published, was the outlook for Monday, which should be the first proper working day of 2020.

Heaven, or the IMF, please help us.

Eskom has given the usual excuses for its abject failures. The conveyer belt at the Medupi power plant, which had triggered Stage 6 in December when it broke down, has been fixed, it said in a statement. But other generation units have gone offline, and Eskom said it had depleted its “diesel and pump storage levels”. At least new Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter is expected to start work from Monday.

Load shedding in 2019 began in earnest in February and rolled into March, heralding a sharp shrinkage of more than 3% in South Africa’s economy. A recession — two straight quarters of contraction — was dodged in Q2, with an unexpected rebound in growth. But the economy shrank again in Q3 and the omens are not good for Q4.

And now 2020 has started — from the fourth day, nogal — with a new round of load shedding, against the backdrop of seasonally induced subdued demand. The ANC, which is celebrating its 108th birthday on Saturday 11 January in Kimberley, may find itself partying with the lights out. A critic or cynic might view that as appropriate. BM