FULL LETTER: Ramaphosa admits ‘sense of despair’ as load shedding continues
President Cyril Ramaphosa says South Africa should brace themselves for more load shedding over the next months.
Power utility Eskom has been struggling to keep lights on in the past weeks, which saw the country being placed on stage 6 load shedding.
Last week the president cut short his overseas trip and rushed back home to deal with the electricity crisis.
In his weekly letter on Monday, Ramphosa said there are real signs of progress and good reasons to be optimistic.
"Given the unpredictable performance of Eskom’s fleet of coal-fired power stations, we will not be able to eliminate loadshedding in the short term. This is the unfortunate reality of our situation, which has had a long history.
"There is a sense of despair that the situation does not seem to be improving and that there appears to be no end in sight to this crisis. Yet, even in the darkness of load shedding there is and must be an end in sight to our electricity crisis."
"As we continue to experience load shedding, there is a great tempation to give up hope that we will ever solve this problem."
Last week, government signed power purchase agreements for 420 MW with the first three preferred bidders under Bid Window 5 of the renewable energy programme.
READ FULL LETTER HERE:
As we work with greater urgency to fix the immediate problem of an unreliable power system, we are also busy laying the groundwork for a sustainable, lasting solution to the country’s electricity woes.https://t.co/ILcDTuzKrs pic.twitter.com/xKaQU7qElE
— Cyril Ramaphosa 🇿🇦 (@CyrilRamaphosa) September 26, 2022
ALSO READ:
