Minister of Public Enterprises Pravin Gordhan. Picture: Refilwe Modise
Black First Land First (BLF) has launched an online petition demanding the removal of Minister of Enterprises Pravin Gordhan.
A statement from the organisation reading, “Stop load shedding! Pravin Gordhan must go!” comes after Eskom’s recent implementation of stage 2 load shedding.
The BLF believes that “load shedding is a tactic used to terrorise the nation into accepting privatisation” and “as long as Pravin Gordhan is a minister, there shall be no solution to this situation”.
The organisation has also suggested President Cyril Ramaphosa’s move of employing Andre de Ruyter as Eskom’s new CEO in November was “yet another good reason to recall Gordhan pronto”.
De Ruyter will oversee a government plan in an attempt to make the state-owned utility more efficient by splitting it into three parts: generation, transmission, and distribution.
Eskom, which generates more than 90% of the country’s power, is in its current form widely viewed as the country’s biggest impediment to growth, though the restructuring plan has taken shape against a backdrop of a stubbornly high unemployment rate, and unions have pledged to fight it.
By the end of the first day, the petition had attracted more than 1,000 signatures, with the target being 10,000.
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