Letter: ANC monopoly on inaction - BusinessLIVE

It’s hard to disagree with ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula’s recent admission that “the ANC does not have the monopoly of ideas” (“ANC responsible for energy crisis, says Mbalula”, January 26). It’s less easy to imagine it accepting competing ideas.

The official reaction to 15 or so years of load-shedding has been a meandering progression of reassurances, war rooms and committees, emergency plans, stakeholder consultations, consensus building, mobilising this, strengthening that and accelerating something else. This mirrors official responses to just about every other serious failing.

An unmistakably statist mindset means that ideas put forward are likely to be held in abeyance for further consideration, something glaringly visible in the leisurely pace at which plans for privately generated power procurement have proceeded. Seldom is there much appetite for prioritising or making serious trade-offs.

As SA languishes in a malaise that threatens its economic prospects, with all the social consequences this entails, Eskom and the government remain committed to policies that hike prices and undermine efficiencies. That’s before their poor implementation enables them to be leveraged for corruption and patronage. Think here of empowerment demands in procurement or localisation requirements.

Think also of racial quotas through the pending Employment Equity Amendment Act, or — if Solidarity’s claims are to be believed (and they have a depressing ring of familiarity about them) — more aggressive racial engineering of Eskom’s workforce. The latter, remember, takes place while skills constraints remain an acknowledged contributor to the power crisis.

The ANC certainly has no monopoly on ideas, but particular ideas seem to exercise a monopoly over the party and the government it heads. If ever there was a monopoly in need of breaking up, this is it.

Terence Corrigan
Institute of Race Relations

https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/opinion/letters/2023-02-02-letter-anc-monopoly-on-inaction/