City of Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has requested that Eskom’s CEO, André de Ruyter formally withdraw their application to increase the price of electricity by 20,5% in the 2022/2023 financial year.
According to a statement issued by Hill-Lewis, he indicated that he made a formal suggestion to the Eskom boss that the application could be revised to bring the planned increase in line with the inflation rate.
“Capetonians simply cannot afford this increase. It is unfair, unaffordable and unjustified. Like the majority of South Africans, many Capetonians are struggling to make ends meet.
“The pandemic and national lockdown led to the closure of hundreds of businesses in our City and the loss of thousands of jobs. Our residents are faltering under the burden of the rising costs of energy, fuel, food, and basic consumer goods,” Hill-Lewis said.
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Hill-Lewis further mentioned that the consumer price index (CPI) currently sits at 5,5% which would have been a more reasonable tariff increase for Eskom, however, the price of electricity has risen by 307% over the past 13 years, far exceeding inflation.
“Despite paying more for power, South Africans have experienced an unreliable electricity supply in 2020 and 2021 were two of the worst load-shedding years on record.
“I also acknowledged that Eskom clearly needs to take further urgent steps to reduce its debt and improve its financial sustainability. However, passing the bill on to struggling consumers should not be the default solution,” Hill-Lewis added.
Meanwhile, several alternative strategies have been suggested to Eskom. These include:
- Urgently reducing Eskom’s bloated payroll
- Cancelling tenders with unscrupulous suppliers who provide Eskom with goods and services at massively inflated prices
- Ending corruption and mismanagement (irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure cost the utility R14,6 billion in 2020 and R7,4 billion in 2019)
- Recovering money that has been looted during the period of state capture
- The law requires the National Energy Regulator (Nersa) to table the 2022/23 price determination in Parliament by no later than 15 March. This means there is still time for Eskom to urgently revise its application.
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Picture: Cape {town} Etc gallery