State of Disaster would help us to 'move with speed', says ANC as SA hit by Stage 6 blackouts

The last closest thing to a National State of Disaster was the Covid emergency and look how that was screwed up.

NO, NO, NO ANC. Declaring a National State of Disaster - The people of South Africa have lost all trust in you - from the people who keep our economy turning over,(and keep you in luxury) to the poorest of the poor we are all gatvol of your looting and lying. Remember, if you make this declaration, we know the ANC Cadres, Officials and MPs will begin looting our tax payers money as soon as they can. We will be watching you and our fearless, DM investigative Journalists will keep us informed with enough facts to put you all in orange overalls. He, he, he.

No need to declare a state of disaster, we've been in a state of disaster for more than two decades with these incompetents. The only thing that will get them to "move with speed" will be dodging bullets at a firing squad which is less than they deserve for all the misery they have subjected the people of this country to.

The really frightening thing about having another State of Disaster thrust upon us is worse than the prospect of the criminal looting opportunity it will enable - as bad as that is - but that like the previous one, it will likely be illegal and prosecutable to question or challenge the government's actions under the SoD regulations. (This is so powerful that DM is still publishing no-commentary disclaimers on some Covid articles way after the suspension of the SoD - shame on you DM). Thus the State of Disaster will give an elite, unelected, unconstitutional, unaccountable committee of a few idiots (with a fancy name like before) carte blanche - again - for the nonsensical, illogical, self-serving and irresponsible infliction of ultimate power on ordinary citizens. Name me one politician who lost their job, their car, their house, their business or their savings under the previous SoD lockdowns THEY imposed on us! And we continued paying them to do it while we were told we had to suck it up for the greater good. No prizes for guessing who's good they meant. There were many who said beware - the powerful don't like relinquishing this kind of power - so here we go again. If you don't think that's what it is about (oh no, the looming elections have nothing to do with it) I don't know where you've been. It's time to take out the trash.

I WOULD VENTURE TO SAY THAT YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE THE SPEED AT WHICH THE STEALING WOULD TAKE PLACE!

These 8.5 pages of political drivel are less than useful. What the ANC _REALLY_ needs to do is: 1. Ditch their Alliance Partners, COSATU and the SACP. They add no value and just take a free ride. 2. Drop the 1960s rhetoric. Words like "Comrade", "National Democratic Revolution" and "Developmental State" provide blinkers that force their thinking into narrow channels, in directions that have been amply demonstrated to lead nowhere. 3. Recognise that Eskom has 5 real problems: a. Appallingly badly maintained Generation equipment. b. A lack of investment in Transmission. c. A lack of investment in and maintenance of Distribution equipment. d. A loss of skills as a result of deliberately non-optimal employment policies. e. Very high levels of corruption and sabotage. 4. Increase the electricity supply by removing the barriers to fixing Eskom. These are all political or criminal: a. Remove all BEE and AA requirements. It’s more important to get Eskom fixed and up and running than to enrich the already privileged ANC tenderpreneurs, or to bother about people’s skin colour. b. Remove all Preferential Procurement requirements. These simply increase the cost to Eskom by 25-30%, enriching the connected and providing zero value to the country. c. Remove all Local Content requirements. If anything is to be regarded as an “emergency” it’s these 3 pieces of political baggage. d. Get serious about actually catching and prosecuting the saboteurs and thieves in Eskom and its suppliers.

Continued ... 5. Recognise that Eskom’s problems will never be solved by “ideas”, or by anything that politicians can come up with. They are Engineering and Finance problems. Use the best available people to solve these problems, regardless of ideology. 6. Increase the electricity supply by fostering own generation: a. Remove all remaining barriers to self-generation and to feeding into the grid. b. Provide significant tax incentives to individuals and businesses to install their own generation equipment. Double it for those who install sufficient storage to cater for their own requirements for at least 8 hours. c. Eskom and Municipalities must pay a reasonable (set by NERSA) feed-in tariff. d. Allow the creation of Virtual Power Plants (VPPs) by interested parties with the right technical and financial skills, where specialist organisations contract with those who have self-generation and/or storage to put their resources under the (remote) control of the VPP to provide Frequency and Ancillary Services (FCAS) to the grid. Those contracting with the VPP are paid for the use of their capacity, and exempted from any network or connection charges. The VPP is in turn paid by Eskom or the relevant Municipalities for FCAS services, which stabilise the network and perform peak shaving. Reward the VPPs handsomely, in the same vein as IPPs. Do not sign long term (20 year) contracts, but automatically renewable contracts, subject to terms.

7. Increase the electricity supply by getting serious about IPPs. The entire concept of the DMRE acting as “gatekeeper” between potential IPPS and Eskom (or any other off taker) is deeply flawed. Why are there “windows”? Why are the processes so long delayed? Why were only a few of those who made proposals in the last round deemed to be acceptable by the DMRE? What does the DMRE actually know about demand, supply or the technical nitty gritty? This is not a political question. It’s a technical and economic question. Can an IPP provide a service that is useful to Eskom, a Municipality or any large user at an acceptable price with acceptable service levels? It’s that simple. Why is the DMRE inserting itself between buyer and seller, to the benefit of neither? 8. Do not sign 20-year contracts with IPPs or any “emergency” procurement. Electricity supply and consumption in RSA must move towards a competitive market, and away from an SOE-based monopoly. 9. Remove all barriers to IPPs as described above: PPPFA, Local Content, etc. Once again, it’s not about enriching the connected. It’s about solving a technical engineering problem – insufficient electricity supply for the demand. 10. Improve Eskom’s cashflow by diverting payments from National or Provincial level to Municipalities in arrears to pay Eskom directly.

Continued ... 11. Reduce demand by: a. Incentivising the installation of solar water heating. This was tried before, but simply resulted in the price of Solar Water Heating systems tripling. A better method is needed, such as tax incentives. Electric geysers typically use 40% of a household's energy. b. Re-introduce Ripple Control on electric geysers, such that these can be turned off remotely at peak times. c. Introduce Time of Use tariffs to everyone, such that energy is more expensive during peak times and cheaper in off -peak times. This requires functional Smart Meters, not decades of waffling and RFPs for tenderpreneurs. d. Foster own generation as discussed in (6) above. 12. Get serious about disconnecting illegal connections and keeping them disconnected. 13. Get serious about disconnecting non-payers, no matter the political cost. There is no reason that the law abiding should subsidise law breakers or free riders. 14. Appoint technical experts, with a smattering of legal and financial experts to Eskom’s Board, irrespective of ideology or political alignment. Accept that politicians are not technical experts and do NOT know better. 15. Having appointed the right people to manage Eskom, get out of their way to do their job. Give them 3 years unconditional support and carte blanche to do what they feel is best, in their expert opinion. It will take at least that long.

Continued, again ... 16. Recognise that “right sizing” Eskom, and municipalities, is essential to helping them to regain financial stability. 17. Stop prevaricating about Eskom’s debt. The ANC took over a functional non-profit entity with R18 billion in reserves in 1997, made it into an SOE and broke it. Government is responsible for the disaster that ensued, and must take responsibility by taking over Eskom’s debt, in exchange for their nominal shareholding. 18. Stop talking about unbundling Eskom into 3 divisions and simply get on with it. Appoint real experts to advise, and actually follow their direction. 19. Move rapidly towards an open, competitive Generation market, supplying a (for now) monopoly Transmission entity, that in turn supplies energy to Distribution entities. 20. Remove Municipalities’ de facto monopoly on distribution. 21. Facilitate wheeling over both the Transmission and Distribution systems, without interference from Eskom or the DMRE. Rates to be set by commercial agreement, with recourse to NERSA if agreement can’t be reached. In short, recognise that Eskom’s problems are not political, therefore a political solution will never solve those problems. A State of Disaster most certainly will not help address any of these issues.