Dear Editor
Despite clear evidence that South Africans are struggling to make ends meet as a result of the high cost of living, the ANC government – through the Minister of Public Enterprises Pravin Gordhan, has gone ahead and authorised another double digit electricity price increase for 2024.
In a letter to the Speaker of Parliament, Gordhan has called for the tabling of a total average upward adjustment for the electricity retail tariff of 12.74% for the 2024/25 financial year.
This is over and above the 18.65% increase that consumers paid for the 2023/24 financial year. In just two years, consumers will see their electricity bills increase by 31% whilst also experiencing a corresponding increase in the number of hours that they spend in the dark due to loadshedding.
The DA is the only party that actively campaigned against the electricity price increase in 2023, culminating in a High Court case in which we argued that NERSA’s extortionate electricity price hike was a corruption tax to reward criminal syndicates operating with impunity at Eskom. It is simply unacceptable that the ANC expects consumers to shoulder the financial burden of high diesel usage and a bloated workforce at Eskom through high electricity tariffs.
This immoral price increase by the ANC government is forcing South Africans to choose between buying electricity or putting food on the table. If this trend of extortionate electricity price hikes continues, electricity will soon become a luxury that many will not be able to afford and will further force many to resort to unsafe sources of energy in order to meet their energy needs. Moreover, the country currently runs the risk of experiencing an exponential increase in energy poverty, where a considerable number of households are struggling to remain connected to the grid due to exorbitant electricity prices.
The Eskom monopoly, with all its inefficiencies and corruption, has become an albatross around the necks of consumers and the economy. Instead of opening up the market to the private sector and helping to lower electricity prices, the ANC government is dragging its feet on key and tangible reforms.
What is clear, is that for as long as the ANC remains in power, these extortionate electricity price increases will never stop. According to independent estimates, since load-shedding started in 2008, electricity increases have grown by 450% – an exponential increase that has far outpaced inflation during the same period. Should this trend continue, South Africa’s electricity prices may very well become the most expensive when compared to other countries in the region and in other emerging markets.
Regards
Dr Mimmy Gondwe MP
DA Shadow Minister of Public Enterprises
Nightwonka
The early bird catches the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese
Sugar Apple
Van is getting married, but he and his fiancee have never done the deed – in fact he\’s never been with any woman before. He\’s getting more and more nervous as the big day approaches, so he confides in his friend. His friend says \’No worries man. I\’ll come by the honeymoon suite before you guys get there, and I\’ll hide behind the curtain, and I\’ll whisper instructions to you.\’
\’You\’d do that for me?\’
\’Sure thing man!\’
So the wedding day arrives, it was a lovely service (so I was told, I wasn\’t there myself) and Van\’s friend sneaks into the honeymoon suite as promised and hides behind the curtain.
Van and his new wife arrive in the room, get settled on the bed, and things are getting steamy.
But Van is still super nervous and his tummy is bubbling, so he murmers to his wife, \’Listen babe, I\’m just gonna go to the bathroom quick. I think it\’s that wors roll from earlier.\’
\’Sure thing babe.\’
So Van goes into the bathroom, and he\’s taking quite a long time. And his wife is starting to feel the nerves herself. And it\’s getting worse. She can\’t hold it in. But she doesn\’t want to go after he\’s gone and totally ruin the mood. So she looks around and finally finds a shoebox. Quickly, she does her business in the shoebox, and she shoves it under the bed just as Van comes back from the loo.
Van gets back on the bed and they go at it again. But after a minute or so Van smells something not so lekker.
\’What\’s that smell?\’
\’Nothing babe,\’ he wife tries to assure him.
\’No man there\’s definitely something not so lekker in this room!\’VSo Van starts looking around the room, in the corners, in the cupboard, and finally he looks under the bed, and sees the shoebox.
He pull it out, and opens it up, and in horror he shouts \’Sies! Daar\’s kak in hierdie doos!\’
And from behind the curtain his friend yells, \’NEE MAN, DRAAI HAAR OM!\”