City Power blackout drama a result of ANC prioritising electioneering ahead of service delivery

25 October 2021

The Eskom – Joburg Mayor – City Power drama of this weekend could not have been scripted by the best screenwriters amongst us. No sooner had Eskom announced its implementation of rolling blackouts on Saturday night, with City Power speedily advising of its execution of same, only for the Joburg’s place-holder Mayor  Moerane to release a statement purportedly rejecting the blackouts – the legal authority upon which he relies is known only to him and his team.

What followed is common cause - City Power claimed what Joburg residents were experiencing (rolling blackouts) was not, in fact, happening. What Joburg residents must undoubtedly be very clear on is that the ANC will stop at nothing to place its electoral priorities over the provision of basic services. They will continue their long-practiced pattern of making big, meaningless cosmetic actions and announcements in the final days of an election campaign, in hopes they will fool voters into giving them another electoral mandate.

Moerane’s attempt at preventing the execution of the blackouts must be understood against that background – yet another desperate attempt to stave off the inevitable, a backlash from the voters in next week’s local government election – where voters are set to ring in the winds of change and deliver an ActionSA-led government to FIX the City of Joburg from years of ANC mismanagement.

This pattern of using basic services to save their doomed election campaign comes on the back of many that have preceded it. Since 2001, the Alexandra Renewal Project was used by the Joburg ANC to try to hold on to votes in one of the most densely populated areas of the City. In the months leading up to the general elections of 2019, there were precious little blackouts and billions of rands were spent, by Eskom, on diesel to keep previously mothballed power stations running so the ANC could claim they had ended the blackouts – only for them to make an unwelcome return after the ANC was returned to power.

In more recent days, the ANC-led Government of Local Corruption in Joburg claimed to have completed what the administration I led started, which the ANC Caucus fought at every turn – the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between City Power, Eskom, and the Kelvin Power Station – in order to reduce the City’s reliance on Eskom for its’ electrical needs.

However, the contents of the MoU seems to be a state secret, such that no one outside of the bosses of these organisations has been able to establish the rationale behind the ANC’s newfound faith in the arrangement and the consequences of whatever modalities may have been agreed to on the basic service needs of residents, as well as the City’s fiscal position.

Whatever may have happened between the political and administrative bosses in the City of Joburg, its City Power, as well as at Eskom, which has placed residents and businesses in peril once more, must ultimately be placed at the door of the ANC.

It is clear now that, indeed, the only logical reason for the ANC to have rushed, in Council, the election of a Mayor a month before the local government elections had the sole intention of using state resources to support the ANC’s doomed election campaign, as well as secure the financial wellbeing of their politically connected elite. Those parties which supported the vote explicitly by voting in favour (the IFP, UDM, Cope, AIC and Al-Jamah) and tacitly by absenting themselves from proceedings (the DA), betrayed the people of Joburg.

To finally resolve the crisis of an ineffectual City Power, an ActionSA-led government in the City of Joburg will;

Reintegrate City Power into the municipal administration: we will improve the governance of City Power by reintegrating the entity into the municipality. We believe that electricity provision should be administrated by those directly elected by residents, rather than an unaccountable board and management team.

Partner with the private sector to diversify Joburg’s energy mix: we will enable independent power producers to supply electricity to the Johannesburg grid so that our residents become less reliant on Eskom’s unreliable and dirty electricity supply.

Increase the repairs, maintenance and infrastructure investment budget: while we work on becoming independent from Eskom, we will stabilise our electricity infrastructure by increasing the budget available for repairs and maintenance and investing in new and upgraded infrastructure.

Our present political system and leaders have failed communities by placing their own interests ahead of those of the electorate. South Africans are correctly gatvol of that. They are gatvol of the lies and political chicanery. South Africans demand Action.

ActionSA is the only party that can FIX South Africa and it starts by fixing our municipalities, chief amongst them being the City of Joburg, and we stand ready to deliver good governance the guarantees the prosperity and safety of all South Africans.

Issued by Herman Mashaba, ActionSA leader and Jobrg Mayoral Candidate, 25 October 2021