Eskom crisis 'a result of public policy failures'
The New South Africa Institute (NSI) believes the dire situation in which power utility Eskom finds itself is due to a failure of public policy.
The institute briefed the media and its stakeholders on Thursday, as it launched “evidence-based policy and applied research on complex problems of government in fledging democracies".
Co-founder and director of NSI Dr Ivor Chipkin says that Eskom’s failures cannot only be looked at through the lens of corruption.
“There are massive failures of public policy here not just with issues of corruption of Eskom, there are massive issues of public policy regarding the structure and the management of Eskom for example one of the most untold of Eskom is the huge centralisation of decision making. It used to be made at power stations by highly qualified, highly autonomous power station managers.
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"Many of the power authorities were removed and centralised at Megawatt Park which is the head office. When there was massive management instability within the management structure at head office, it translated into tremendous instability at the organisation.”
The crisis at Eskom has seen President Cyril Ramaphosa appoint a Minister of Electricty, Dr Kgosientso Ramokgopa.
Ramokgopa has been tasked with resolving load shedding as speedily as possible.
