We are seriously concerned by the unbearable impact of the nationwide rolling load-shedding, including on critical social infrastructure, such as institutions of learning and teaching, clinics, hospitals, and bulk water infrastructure.

Load-shedding negatively impacts the supreme right to life.

It aggravates the burden of unemployment and poverty, and undermines our ability to create employment and build sustainable livelihoods.

Increases in electricity tariffs by Eskom have contributed to the rising costs of living which mostly affect the workers and poor.

Eskom must reduce and then end load-shedding as a matter of urgency.

Eskom is already hollowed out through outsourcing. This is one way in which its operations have been privatise—that is, awarded as tenders to profit-driven private subcontractors.

Outsourcing of Eskom operations also goes hand-in-hand with and is driven through bribery and other forms of corruption. It is a fact that some cause breakdowns or damage to Eskom infrastructure to be contracted to fix what they themselves have broken.

Outsourcing has contributed in no small measure to sabotage and increases in breakdowns and electricity tariffs, as Eskom incurs the costs it should not incur at all.

We are demanding the following:

• Eskom must stop load shedding as a matter of urgency.
• All communities should be provided with the necessary lighting to walk safely in the night.
• All households should enjoy the benefits of energy supply to run all the necessary family equipment and needs.
• Eskom should ensure an uninterrupted power supply for the economy, especially but not only the productive sector, to run and create employment.
• Eskom must urgently review outsourced operations, coupled with a decisive intervention to end corruption, including through in-sourcing, to deal with the root of the problem.
• There must be a dedicated focus to complete the Medupi and Kusile Power Station projects, as a matter of urgency, and to hold to account those responsible for all the unnecessary delays that affected the completion of the two projects.
• More decisive action must be taken against those who have looted Eskom. Every attempt should be made to recover financial losses from them, and to seize their ill-gotten assets or wealth. More decisive action must be taken  against those responsible for the sabotage of Eskom, and to protect it from sabotage.
• The state has to continue to provide financial and other support to stabilise, strengthen and turn around Eskom, besides the measures announced in the 2023/2024 national budget, but this must be accompanied by stronger oversight and more decisive accountability.
• It is not too late for South Africa to forge a public pathway to the transition to low-carbon and renewable energy generation, which must be a just transition including protecting workers’ rights. Within this framework, Eskom must be recapitalised to take primary responsibility for the transition to low-carbon power generation and renewable sources of energy and serve as the mainstay of our national energy security. The state can also consider establishing an additional public utility to complement Eskom as part of forging a public pathway. To restore the essence of public utilities, ensure the provision of energy on a developmental basis, as a public good, and with wider access to the workers and poor in particular, the model of “full cost recovery” must be reviewed.
•  The transition should include solutions such as carbon capture and sequestration and other solutions that can significantly reduce carbon emissions from coal-fired power generation, which should continue to form part of our base load in an energy mix policy.
• Social ownership linked with democratisation of the energy generation space to complement public utilities should be explored, but this must not be co-opted to feed the root of profit-driven private power producers.
• Support for working-class and poor households with solar power solutions remains essential, as opposed to the elite approach chosen by the government in the 2023 State of the Nation Address and the 2023/2024 budget, which leave the workers and poor behind. This should be linked with localisation to manufacture and assemble the parts and components locally as part of our industrial development and employment creation strategies.
• Eskom must build new power stations and maintain existing power stations to original equipment manufacturer specifications to ensure uninterrupted power supply to households, social infrastructure such as clinics and hospitals and the economy broadly.
• Eskom must strengthen itself as a public utility, as part of the general programme to support industrialisation, employment creation, energy security, and a just energy transition.

Received by:

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Representative of ESKOM

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Representative of the South African Communist Party

Name:___________________________ Signature:____________