Hon
Shivambu, for better part of my life I was an activist opposing a government. Now, when you are in an opposition and opposing a government, you have all the ready answers because you take no responsibility. Now, in our case, we understand that we can't just give instructions in a constitutional democracy.
You need to talk to those producers because Eskom procured coal and signed contracts. Therefore, what we are intervening at is to say that the contracts are too costly for Eskom. Can we have a sense of saying as it was up to the early 90s that, the price of coal for domestic was indexed, and export prices were also indexed, and at that time, those prices were never the same?
Therefore, we say that the same practice can be reintroduced. But if you want stability, you do that by engaging the coal producers. The same applies to Integrated Resource Plan, IRP, windows 1, 2 and 3. Again, there was a risk taken to introduce the technology. That is what our argument is about, that risk has been subsidised by the state.
Therefore, let's talk to one another and agree on reducing it, so that there is stability in Eskom. We can then talk of administered prices for customers who are intensive consumers of electricity. We are only the strange country that go out there and ask people to consume less of the product that we are producing. It only happens with Eskom, and when there is a decline in demand, we think that it's a positive development and it's not.
Decline in demand of electricity is a sign of the industrialisation. So, we are dealing with that with an open mind, and we are appreciating of the fact that we are not dictatorial; we are managing an economy of the country.