Chairperson, firstly, we should be clear that none of the political parties, least the ANC, is happy with this Bill. I don't think that the executive and certainly the Minister and the Deputy Minster as well as the director-general are happy with this Bill. So, it is not a Bill that we enthusiastically support, as we have indicated to Mr Ryder and his colleagues of the DA and the EFF, Mr Fanie Botha is here. So, firstly, we are not happy with this Bill.
In fact, the clear position of the chairperson of the committee, representing the ANC was that we want the conditions for the allocation of this money to be put in the law. However, after further discussions within our party, we felt it is absurd to put it in the law, because conditions change all the time. We live in volatile, uncertain circumstances. So, every time you want to add more stringent conditions, you will have to go back and change the
law and that could take you up to a year, by the time you gazetted it.
Then we said, let us make it part of the regulations. We discovered, as we got closer to agreement on that ... Mr Rider is right; there was agreement across all political parties that we should put it in the Bill. Then Treasury came back to us. Where Mr Rider is right is that Treasury should have alerted us at the outset that our decision across political parties should be to insert it into the regulations rather than into the Bill, and that the conditions for this allocation are not feasible for the certain reasons.
When those reasons were spelt out, it made perfect sense to us. It would take up to a year for the Minister to regulate, for it to be gazetted, for public comments, for Parliament - if it decides in law - to approve those regulations.
One could even argue - though I don't think that it is Mr Ryder's intent - that it is a sinister attempt by the DA to destroy Eskom and this country, simply so that the ANC government can fail.
Eskom does not belong to the ANC, it belongs to the country. [Applause.] For Eskom to collapse would mean the whole democratic
project, which the DA does not support ... As we know full well from the conditions of the last three weeks, they have essentially gone back to being a white party. They say race does not matter. In a country that has the most racial inequalities in the world, they say race does not matter. How are they going to win the votes of black people? I do not know.
Let me go on. On this, we must be clear. There is a fundamental difference between the DA and us, not on the Bill. They have a different vision of the role of the NCOP. They think we are in a federal state. So, even Bills on which we do not have concurrent powers and functions, they want us to go through what is not required in terms of the Constitution or any constitutional court decision. Yes, on section 76 Bills, there must be full active public participation. On Bills that are not concurrent, we have a limited role and even then, there is no space for the public to participate. The Constitution prescribes what the role of the NCOP is and the roles of Parliament make it clear what public participation is, as endorsed by the courts.
So, what would be the point of somebody saying to put it in the regulations when it is not feasible? So, please, let us deal with the issues and let us not politicise it. Thank you. [Applause.]