Thank you very much, Deputy Speaker, the Minister of Finance is tabling a special appropriation Bill, which is basically a request to withdraw R59 billion from the National Revenue Fund, NRF, with the intention of giving that money to Eskom on the illusionary hope that such is going to save Eskom from the current financial crisis.
In 2015, the then Minister of Finance, Nhlanhla Nene, tabled the same Bill, which was asking for R23 billion and also asked for the conversion of a R60 billion loan into equity, which was the previous intervention of the state into Eskom.
All of these are made with the intention that it will lead to the stabilisation of Eskom. Since the R23 billion request, there were lots of conditionalities and
commitments made here that that will be the last time we make an intervention at Eskom. But where are we now? Eskom is still in a debt of more than R400 billion.
In the current financial year, it made losses of more than R20 billion. Now, we are being asked to agree on the withdrawal of R59 billion from the NRF to again give it to Eskom. But there are far much deeper crises at Eskom, which the political leadership is ignoring: firstly, is that there is a leadership crisis. We have a chairperson of a board who is incompetent and has been appointed as an Acting CEO; and secondly, there is no stability with regards to the leadership at Eskom.
The bigger crisis that Eskom is facing is the stabilisation of coal prices. The National Energy Regulator of SA, Nersa, said that the coal prices must cost about R350,00 per ton, but currently, Glencore is supplying coal to Eskom at more than R600,00 per ton. And that is the case with the established coal suppliers. Eskom will never gain stability unless coal prices of the supply has been stabilised.
The other factor which is being ignored deliberately by the politicians is the power purchase agreements that Eskom spends more than 25% on primary costs on Independent Power Producers, IPPs, but the IPPs only generate about five percent of the energy that is needed. There is no sense with regard to retention of the power purchase agreements in the manner in which they are designed currently.
Let us now talk to what should happen; if we were to agree to a special appropriation Bill: firstly, we must fire Jabu Mabuza as the chairperson and Acting CEO and supplier ... [Applause.] ... of Eskom - he is service provider at Eskom - He is incompetent. There will never be changes that will happen under the stewardship of Jabu Mabuza; secondly, we must stabilise the prices of coal to the Nersa's acceptable and given levels; and lastly, we should fundamentally review power purchase agreements with the IPPs.
The new leadership of Eskom should have the autonomy to independently negotiate the power purchase agreements without the imposition from the Department of Mineral
Resources and Energy or whoever is doing so because in many instances the leadership of Eskom is not aware as to who has signed those power purchase agreements. That is what should happen in the immediate.
The other thing that must be looked into is not to unbundle a crisis-ridden Eskom. It cannot be said that there is a crisis that is defining the power utility and break it down into three entities; that is just going to deepen the crisis.
The other thing that must be done is that the state should establish an independent renewable energy division so that we do not fully depend on the private power producers to generate renewable energy. As a long-term or medium-term intervention, you should pursue nuclear energy but in a physically neutral way. You can have a build operate transfer model that can have those that have money build, operate and transfer later on to the state with regards to how it should be.
The other issue that must be dealt with is that you should assemble a highly skilled team to investigate the
delays on the completion of Kusile and Medupi Power Stations because there is a lot of money that has already been lost there. There is no clarity as when are we going to plug Medupi and Kusile into the national grip. So, we might then need to deal with that in the immediate. Unless all these things have been dealt with adequately, the EFF will not agree to the continuous withdrawal of money from the NRF to just throw into a bottomless pit called Eskom. Thank you very much. [Applause.]