Problems many in SA – Mbeki
LOAD SHEDDING: IRONICALLY, THIS CAN BE TRACED BACK TO HIS TENURE AS PRESIDENT
Critical ingredient to resolve these is good leadership in government, society.
Former president and chancellor of the University of SA (Unisa) Thabo Mbeki does not believe it requires a referendum to address the enormous challenges facing the country.
Speaking during a dialogue with Unisa students yesterday, Mbeki said SA was facing serious challenges, ranging from leadership and safety and security, to the economy, among others.
In recent times, Mbeki has not minced his words, and used every possible opportunity to speak publicly about the country’s challenges, including that of the governing ANC. “A critical ingredient needed to resolve those problems is good leadership in government and generally in society,” he said.
“Just before I came, former statistician-general Pali Lehohla made an interesting observation regarding the energy issue, that Eskom is a big engineering institution but also a big business. And he said, therefore, in terms of its leadership, you need engineers and economists, but instead we have politicians and accountants.
“I am not saying he was right, but he was looking at the issue of the quality of leadership in the country. Why do we seem to be incapable to address this matter? Is it because of what Pali is raising? Maybe it’s the answer.”
SA has for the past year been grappling with load shedding which was ramped up to stage 6 last weekend, only to be reduced to stage 5 on Tuesday evening.
“Why are the new power stations [Medupi and Kusile] misbehaving like the old ones?” he asked.
Ironically, the roots of the current electricity crisis can be traced back to Mbeki’s tenure as president. He infamously believed investing in electricity infrastructure was not a priority, and that the private sector would step in to plug the cracks which were beginning to show as far back as the early 2000s.
In 2006, he told the National Assembly there was no energy crisis, and that load shedding – which was then a new phenomenon – was simply an “opportunity for economic growth through infrastructure expansion”.
The M&G reported then that Mbeki responded to parliamentary questions about the electricity outages that: ”We shouldn’t frighten ourselves too much.
“Yes, indeed, there was a problem. There were regrettable losses suffered by many businesses, but there is no crisis. Whatever needs to be done to make sure that the economy grows and new investors come into the economy is being done on the energy and other sides.”
At the time, he denied the power outages had any negative effects on investment sentiments.
Despite his criticism, Mbeki yesterday said at some point during the pandemic, he believed there was some hope for SA.
“In 2020, particularly, we had something that came out of South Africa which was positive that business, government, labour and civil society... everyone was saying the economic challenges are so big that we need to get together to solve them. Two years have passed and nothing has happened.
“Many years ago, some of us were saying the strategic task was to eradicate the legacy of apartheid but we are nowhere near… We have not done anything to eradicate that legacy, because within that legacy you will find the social justice issue that was talked about in 2020.”