That need for electricity cuts across age, race, gender, class, creed, and whatever other identity category the social engineers might want to fuss about. It doesn’t matter how you look, South Africans have to fight load-shedding together. The only way out of load-shedding is more reliable power generation at the lowest price, which is not going to happen if citizens do not insist on that.
Eskom has many problems, but none will be solved without realising that the government confused power stations with social laboratories to test paint-by-numbers political theories. The winners were corrupt cadres of all races and the losers were all people who need electricity for heat, cooking, and work. The IRR has warned against BEE’s perverse incentives since its inception, while emphasizing the positive eagerness of most people to work together regardless of colour. There are five basic reasons to reboot the battle for merit over melanin at Eskom right now.
First, powerlessness has never been so bad. This can foment "fallist" rage that leads to buildings being burned down, or it can depress people to the point where they just give up. Alternatively, South Africa’s downward spiral can clarify the mind, to focus on what matters, and to actively seek solutions. A good time to pull the parachute is while you still can.
Second, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana already granted an exemption to Eskom from BEE procurement once in 2022, after the IRR's call to do just that, so we have a precedent to call for it again.
Third, Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter subsequently agreed that there was a case to make for allowing such BEE exemptions on a more substantial basis.
Fourth, experienced staff who were previously expelled under political pressure are being brought back and even Minister Pravin Gordhan admits the need "to cut the damn red tape" at Eskom.
Fifth, the Zondo Commission Report tackled the issue of racial procurement directly, effectively saying that you have to choose between penny-pinching and colour-coding urgently:
“Ultimately in the view of the [Zondo] Commission the primary national interest is best served when the government derives the maximum value-for-money in the procurement process and procurement officials should be so advised.”
It could not have been easy for Zondo to sign off on this recommendation of merit over melanin. Four days later, Minister Lindiwe Sisulu wrote that Zondo, or people like him, are "mentally colonized", along with other vicious racial slurs.
We know that it takes guts to sign off on what is right and reasonable in South Africa, as Zondo did. But as the country runs out of power is there any alternative?
