Load shedding: How much progress since Ramaphosa’s last Sona?

Fellow South Africans, President Cyril Ramaphosa will once again host a family meeting to reflect on 2023 – and outline his plans for the current year.

The annual State of the Nation Address (Sona) will take place on Thursday in Cape Town.

While our honourable members get their designer gowns and tuxedos ready for the red carpet, let’s throwback to February last year for a brief moment of reflection.

ALSO READ: Here’s what was promised in the last Sona, and what has changed

Lights on, lights off

South Africa’s energy crisis has been the subject of many boardroom and bedroom conversations.

While business owners continually stay up at night, wondering how to keep the lights on during load shedding to meet monthly targets, households have been forced to align their daily routines with Eskom’s schedule.

During last year’s Sona, Ramaphosa said addressing load shedding was an urgent priority.

“Our most immediate task is to dramatically reduce the severity of load shedding… and ultimately end load shedding altogether,” he said.

Ramaphosa’s plans for Eskom included bringing back three Kusile units to the grid and securing funding to sustain the utility’s diesel-powered plants.

“This should reduce the severity of load shedding as Eskom will be able to use its diesel-run plants when the system is under strain.”

Ramaphosa’s rabbit-out-the-hat trick was seemingly appointing an Electricity Minister to “oversee all aspects of the electricity crisis response”.

So, has government’s attempts to mitigate the impact of load shedding been fruitful? Economist Dawie Roodt doesn’t think so.

ALSO READ: Sona: Hope that Ramaphosa will refrain from sloganeering

One year later…

Speaking to The Citizen, Roodt said the impact of power cuts on SA’s economy remained significant.

“We’ve never had so much load shedding as [we did] last year. The impact on the economy is huge – that is the single most important reason why the economy is doing as badly as it is,” he said.

The economist also said that government’s mitigation strategies had done very little to boost investor confidence, adding that consumer confidence was also at its lowest.

Getting Transnet back on the rails

Transnet’s embattled ports and infrastructural challenges also made it onto Ramaphosa’s monologue.

The state-owned enterprise (SOE) has struggled to stay on the rails in recent years, posing a logistical nightmare for SA’s industries.

“Our rail network has suffered from many years of under-investment, lack of maintenance, criminal activity and inefficiency,” Ramaphosa said.

Coming up with a national rail policy to rescue the SOE and modernise the rail sector formed part of Ramaphosa’s game plan.

“We are working across government to develop a Transnet roadmap that will translate our policy commitments into reality, including the restructuring of Transnet Freight Rail to create a separate infrastructure manager for the rail network by October 2023.”

ALSO READ: What the Sona and budget hold for South Africa

On track, Mr President?

Weighing in, Roodt said Transnet’s embattled freight rail and ports had significantly impacted the economy, adding that the export industry had been most affected.

The economist considers efforts made to revive Transnet’s infrastructure over the last year unsuccessful, blaming poor leadership and corruption.

“We’ve got a government that is quite often incompetent and corrupt,” he said.