Durban - A national state of disaster and the appointment of a Minister of Electricity were the two major announcements made by President Cyril Ramaphosa in his State of the Nation Address (Sona) last night to deal with the country’s energy crisis.
However, the address was not without disruption as the EFF’s Julius Malema and Floyd Shivambu among others raised points of order insisting that Ramaphosa should not address Parliament due to the Phala Phala farm theft scandal.
“He has passed a motion of no confidence in his Parliament. Until he has resolved the dispute between us and him, he has no leg (sic) to address,” Malema said.
Ramaphosa has taken a report of the Section 89 panel, which found that he may have a case to answer on Phala Phala, on judicial review in the Constitutional Court.
When Ramaphosa had another opportunity to address the House, he was heckled by EFF members, a move that prompted National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula to call out names of several MPs and order them to leave.
Eventually some EFF MPs attempted to storm the podium which resulted in the security services and police being called in and they all left, or were removed from the House.
When he was able to present his address some 45 minutes later, Ramaphosa announced that a national state of disaster was being declared to respond to the electricity crisis and its effects.
“The Minister of Cogta has just gazetted the declaration of the state of disaster, which will begin with immediate effect,” he said.
“The state of disaster will enable us to provide practical measures that we need to take to support businesses in the food production, storage and retail supply chain, including for the roll-out of generators, solar panels and uninterrupted power supply.”
He also added that there would be a minister of electricity who will focus on dealing with the crisis.
“To deal more effectively and urgently with the challenges that confront us, I will appoint a minister of electricity in the presidency to assume full responsibility for overseeing all aspects of the electricity crisis response, including the work of the national energy crisis committee,” Ramaphosa said.
He said the auditor-general would be brought in to ensure continuous monitoring of expenditure, in order to guard against any abuse of the funds needed to fix the disaster.
Reacting to the announcement, Ntokozo Nzimande, a senior lecturer in the department of economics at UCT, said the decision might revive some optimism that the government was determined to deal with the energy crisis.
“Considering, however, what happened during Covid-19, stringent measures will need to be in place to ensure that resources are used effectively and efficiently. So, the history of the state of disasters or emergencies doesn’t really inspire hope.”
Nzimande said that South Africans and the business community were likely to adopt a wait and see approach regarding the state of disaster.
Sanele Gumede, an economics lecturer at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, said the state of disaster appeared to be aimed at creating more focus on load shedding with a dedicated team.
However, Gumede said it was not clear what role the minister of electricity would play as Ramaphosa had made it clear that Eskom will still fall under the minister of public enterprises.
“It is not clear how this will function. It becomes unclear who Eskom listens to, will they listen to this new minister or the minister of public enterprises?”
He also agreed that the potential for corruption would be heightened.
“There is a potential for corruption because if there is an emergency, some of the regulations will not be followed, which is an easy target for corruption to come in. Like we have seen with the Covid-19 regulations, with money for PPE not going where it was supposed to go.”
DA leader John Steenhuisen said the party had briefed its lawyers to challenge the state of disaster announcement in court.
He said a national state of disaster under the guise of dealing with the load shedding crisis would similarly empower the ANC to abuse procurement processes and issue nonsensical regulations that had nothing to do with the electricity crisis.
ActionSA’s president Herman Mashaba said the party was opposed to the state of disaster.
“The irony of the state of disaster is that it is a crisis entirely of the ANC’s making. ActionSA reiterates its opposition to a state of disaster and the powers it will afford the executive to abuse state resources. We simply cannot afford to go through this again.”
Meanwhile, the EFF last night said they would seek legal advice on their MPs removal.
Malema asked why the Presidential Protection and Counter Assault units were on the stage inside Parliament when they had not been summoned by Mapisa-Nqakula.
“We don’t know exactly how many people were injured but our national chairperson (Veronica Mente) is not here. She was injured … a group of men were stomping on her.”
ATM leader Vuyo Zungula, who was also asked to leave the sitting, said Mapisa-Nqakula kicked him out to try and “intimidate me as a member of Parliament”.
“For a person to be kicked out, they need to be given a warning first. This did not happen, without a warning I was told to leave the house.”
| Additional Reporting Mercury Reporter