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Could it be that Eskom is holding us to ransom? I'm very wary about monopolies and even sectors where the competition is limited. Eskom's load shedding strategy seems very suspicious to me.
Eskom has publicly stated that they will have to increase the price of electricity by 100% over the next year. They have applied for a 53% increase this year and have stated that, unless it is awarded to them, they will have to apply for 100% next year instead of 40%. They have tried to justify this increase by pointing out that our electricity is cheap compared to the rest of the world and on their website they have a graph available to prove that their previous years increases were well below the CPI. The statement about our electricity being cheaper is a blatant lie. Not only does a direct comparison of electricity prices in other countries disprove this claim but, even worse, according to Stats SA Eskom is selling electricity to our neighbours at a quarter of the price that is being charged to South African households. If Eskom is selling the cheapest electricity in the world, as they claim, it is not to us but to our neighbours. Comparing the increases to the CPI, supplied by Stats SA, should be fair. Unfortunately I do not believe this to be the case. The 'basket' used by Stats SA to determine the CPI does not reflect the actual cost of living of the poor or even the average middle class household. A basic shopping basket, not including any luxuries, but just basics like bread, milk, soap, fruit, vegetables, etc, have increased by about 20% over the last two years. This is considerably more than the figures supplied by Stats SA will have one believe. An electricity price increase will affect these people the most and their inflation will become even worse and basics less affordable.
Anyway, back to my original thought that we are being held to ransom. Eskom has now introduced load shedding. Extremely well planned in my opinion, seeing as I was without electricity three nights running one weekend. This load shedding is just blackmail, pure and simple. They know that people do not want the inconvenience caused by load shedding and they are exploiting this to the hilt. If they switch off the electricity often enough the people won't mind paying the additional increases that they are insisting on. The consumer cannot determine whether the load shedding is essential or not but one thing is sure, Eskom cannot now afford to stop the load shedding as their argument for the increase then becomes invalid. Eskom wants the increase, thus we the average household will be burdened with load shedding until they get the ridiculous increase insisted upon by them. If there is such a dire shortage of generating capacity how is it that, according to figures supplied by Stats SA, our export of electricity to neighbouring countries have increased by 13% from January 2007 to January 2008? Obviously Eskom does not care about the inconvenience suffered by the South African consumer. Surely if they cut the export of electricity, remember that this is sold at a quarter of the price we South Africans pay, and sold more of it locally their profits will be higher and the increase insisted upon will become lower or even superfluous.
Load shedding seems to be the result of blatant mismanagement yet the management of Eskom received, and are still receiving, bloated bonuses. My logic says that these bonuses are theft of public funds, nothing more, nothing less.Over the past three years the 24 member board was paid R35-million, while non-executive directors got R4.7-million. Current CEO Jacob Maroga received R3-million in his former position as head of the Transmission Division. Remarkably, these massive amounts were paid while the current power problems were looming. The comment that management earned their latest bonuses for the way they handled the crisis is laughable. They caused the crisis by sitting back and doing nothing to increase the supply. I would love to have a job where I can do nothing until my inactivity results in a crisis which I can then solve by inconveniencing others without doing anything about addressing the actual reason for the crisis which action then allows me an inflated bonus for effectively doing nothing.
The number of blatant lies being spread by Eskom and the SA Government regarding the electricity crisis really concerns me. I am reaching the stage where I think the Government is totally corrupt whereas previously I was of the opinion that just a small portion of the people in Government may be corrupt. Some of the blatant lies regarding the electricity issue:
- Let me be very clear on this. The bolt that caused the generator's destruction did not get there by accident - Alec Erwin
The truth: The bolt came loose and damaged the Koeberg nucleur power plant due to insufficient maintenance.
- Eskom usually exports about 1.5% of its power to neighbouring utilities, and another 3% to industrial customers, mainly the Mozal smelter in Mozambique - Eskom spokesman Andrew Etzinger
The truth: In January 2008 7% of electricity generated in South Africa were exported to our neighbours.
- We have said so — that the prices will increase. Nevertheless we will still remain the source of the cheapest electricity in the world - President Thabo Mbeki
The truth: Eskom is exporting electricity to our neighbours at a quarter of the price that South African households pay. Forget about the rest of the world, it is obvious that our electricity is not even the cheapest in southern Africa.
- The underlying problem is the very significant rise in demand - particularly over the past few years - resulting from an economy working at full capacity, the rising standards of living with close on 3.5 million homes having access to electricity since 1994. In this sense, we are the victims of our own success - Alec Erwin
The truth: A White Paper of 1998 said that the country would run out of electricity by 2007. Despite the dire prediction, it was never acted upon
- We have unplanned outages. That is something that has been increasing slightly lately - Dr Steve Lennon (Director of Corporate Services, Eskom)
The truth: During the maintenance cycle in February 2007 Eskom's output was more than 32 000MW but by 27 January 2008 this has decreased to a low of 27 000MW. 15% is more than a slight decrease thus I'm not sure that these can be called unplanned outages. With this knowledge available surely they were at least foreseeable which makes the outages, in a way, planned as nothing was done to rectify the problem.
- According to the confidential report, the most prominent reason for unplanned outages seems to be wet coal. On Thursday coal problems were given as the reason for breakdowns at more than 20 power stations. Almost 4 000MW were lost - enough to power up Johannesburg
The truth: Chris Badenhorst, who has been working with coal for most of his life, says: 'It rains every year. Every summer all the coal gets wet and they have never had a problem before, why should they have a problem now? Coal burns better when it's wet than when it's dry.'
- Eskom CEO Jacob Maroga says that we are not currently exporting electricity
The truth: During the same time that our gold mines were shut because the power supply was cut we exported 761MW to the MOZAL aluminium smelter in Maputo and Swaziland was receiving 476MW, Botswana 103MW, Namibia 126MW and Zimbabwe 51MW.
- Your assertion that planning did not anticipate the demand is not correct. The recent events in the Cape is not (and should not be seen as) an indication that South Africa has run out of capacity and therefore cannot meet the demand - Fani Zulu Eskom spokesman, May 2006
Needs no comment, having run out of capacity is obvious in these dark days.
With all these lies, and believe me there are many more but I just couldn't be bothered to research them all as the above is bad enough, why or how can be believe any statement by an Eskom spokesman or a Government official. I'm sure that the public at large realises, just as I do, that they are all blatant liars not fit for public office. Load shedding, bah humbug. Stop exporting our electricity and cease the blackmail.
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