The South African Communist Party (SACP) continues to lament rolling blackouts, calling for its immediate end.
SACP General Secretary Solly Mapaila was speaking at the annual commemoration of the passing of struggle stalwart, Joe Slovo at the Avalon Cemetery in Soweto on Friday.
It is the 28th anniversary of the death of the anti-apartheid struggle icon and former general secretary.
6 January 2023: Joe Slovo Commemoration at Avalon Cemetery in Soweto pic.twitter.com/aSSg8FATT8
— SACP (@SACP1921) January 6, 2023
He called for the government to solve the electricity crisis and stop rolling blackouts immediately. South Africa is currently experiencing continuing rolling blackouts.
Mapaila says, “We commemorate Joe Slovo amid a devastating load shedding in our country. When the government adopted the white paper on energy in 1998, load shedding is a problem for us in this country and it has to be stopped. There is no reason why it must continue at the pace it is.”
‘Take over leadership of whole Eskom’
Mapaila says load shedding is not only the result of state capture at Eskom, but of a failed Neo-Liberal paradigm adopted by the government.
Eskom has blamed load shedding on a number of issues including sabotage of power plants by sub-contractors. Mapaila says government must take over the leadership of the whole Eskom production of energy.
“To secure electricity supply when saboteurs are contracted by Eskom requires us to take over that particular supply process and not allow sub-contracting in supply work. We must empower Eskom to fulfill its own mandate and not rely on……at the cost….they make money at the expense of the South African economy.”
‘Slovo played pivotal role’
The SACP’s Alex Mashilo says Slovo played a pivotal role in South Africa’s liberation struggle and the new democratic dispensation.
“He contributed immensely to the development of the key document of the ANC and SACP, guiding the liberation struggle led by these two formations in alliance with the progressive trade union movement in South Africa until we succeeded to dislodge the Apartheid regime in April 1994. He was a key figure in the negotiations that paved the way to the text of our Constitution that we have today.” -Additional reporting by Tshepo Phagane
