By Loushe Jordaan Gilbert
There is much debate over what President Cyril Ramaphosa will say during the State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Thursday evening, which comes after NERSA confirmed a more than 12% rise in Eskom electricity rates at the beginning of April.
Energy specialist Thomas Garner said the president had a lot to think about before the speech, emphasising that dealing with a problem like Eskom was not as easy as some people think.
“It is easy to say that the president should speak about unbundling the distribution grid at Eskom, but that would lead to the challenge of unpaid debt and the massive debt owed to the entity by municipalities. What we need to look at holistically is the plan for getting the municipal revenue right as this is an issue,” he added.
When asked about the increase in tariffs, Garner said this was a very complex issue.
“This is very challenging. Eskom admitted in its financial statement in 2024 that they had lost 10% in revenue due to load-shedding, which was self-inflicted and another 10% due to internal corruption, however, they would not be able to recover this revenue through increasing tariffs as people simply cannot afford, they need to focus on sorting out internal challenges to see effective change,” he stressed.
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