Mr President, the answer to Eskom’s woes can be found in a mirror

Cyril Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation Address (Sona) on Thursday night showed how deep a mess South Africa is in.

The announcement of a state of disaster and the appointment of a new minister of energy was only an attempt to show South Africa that “we are doing something about load shedding”. Nothing more. A new minister will achieve nothing.

Watch/read: 2023 Sona – National state of disaster declared on electricity crisis

We already have a minister of mineral resources and energy and a minister for state-owned entities. It would have been more productive to have fired both, and appoint competent ministers.

In fact, they should have been fired long ago.

Ramaphosa should have addressed Eskom’s core problems:

• The lack of skills to maintain and fix power stations quickly and adequately;
• The cost of diesel to run open-cycle gas turbines;
• Corruption and sabotage;
• A poor distribution network, incapable of connecting new capacity to the grid;
• Local authorities not paying their Eskom bills;
• A bankrupt balance sheet;
• Ministries not supporting Eskom’s leadership; and
• Having a capable CEO.

The solutions are, therefore, quite simple:

• Immediately appoint as many skilled engineers as possible;
• Give Eskom a wholesale fuel licence;
• Declare corruption and sabotage treason;
• Unbundle the distribution network and prioritise its immediate upgrade;
• Force local authorities to pay for electricity;
• Appoint new, capable ministers who support Eskom’s leadership; and
• The president should go on his knees and plead with André de Ruyter to stay in his job.

Ramaphosa’s solution of declaring a national state of disaster and appointing a new minister does not address any of these problems.

Almost all of these problems require money, which is probably the easiest way to fix them.

The only answer is to privatise Eskom.

It is as simple as that, as the government has been unable to run the power utility for nearly two decades. The proceeds of privatisation can be used to pay off Eskom’s debt, and private-sector electricity specialists will fix the mess.

While we are on the topic, if Ramaphosa feels new ministers are needed for individual national problems, he should appoint new ministers for femicide, murder, corruption, local government, water infrastructure, potholes, copper cables, railways, traffic lights, taxis, rubbish and red tape. (There are many others).

But wait, we already have ministers who are responsible for those issues. They are not overworked, as South Africa has one of the most oversized cabinets in the world.

The appointment of new ministers is not the solution to the problem of existing ones being useless.

So maybe the core structural problem in our beautiful country is a president who clings to the outdated policy of a developmental state and doesn’t act decisively in the country’s interest.

The core problem can be found in a mirror. The president should just take a look.