DA calls for joint parliamentary sitting to discuss electricity crisis

South Africa continues to experience rolling blackouts due to Eskom’s failure to produce enough generation capacity to meet demands.

DA Chief Whip, Natasha Mazzone says President Cyril Ramaphosa should be called in parliament to address South Africa’s unfolding electricity crisis.

“Eskom’s inability to maintain a reliable supply of electricity has effectively subjected the country to rolling blackouts much more frequently than any time in the past 14 years. The electricity crisis has become the single biggest threat to livelihoods and our economy. With millions of South Africans having lost their jobs as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, it cannot be business as usual when load shedding is said to be costing the economy R500 million per stage, per day,” says Mazzone.

Mazzone says Ramaphosa and Public Enterprises Minister, Pravin Gordhan, have seemingly taken a passive approach to solving the country’s electricity woes.

“It has therefore not only become necessary for Parliament to show leadership in articulating a coherent response to the electricity crisis but the legislature’s constitutional obligation to hold the Executive to account on this issue has never been more urgent.

Should the rolling blackouts continue unabated, investor confidence in South Africa will continue to erode and the ability of our economy to recover from the low growth trap that it is currently ensnared in will be impossible,” she says.

ALSO READ