Hon Speaker, once again South Africans are enduring blackouts throughout the country due to the ANC not having sufficiently dealt with the electricity crisis which it first created over six years ago.
The real underlying cause of these blackouts is that the ANC government has simply not done enough in the past six years to ensure that our country has an adequate supply of electricity. This is the real story behind these blackouts and for the ANC, I am afraid, it's certainly not a good one. The dodgy deals and the failure of Eskom to build Medupi and Kusile on time have meant that our reserve margin has always been on the verge of plunging our country into darkness.
Eskom's inefficiency has held our entire economy to ransom and yet the ANC remains determined to maintain Eskom's monopoly control over our energy system. Just this week, the ANC once again blocked my attempt to revive the Independent System and Market Operator Bill, a piece of legislation which would have taken the grid away from Eskom and created a more level playing field for independent power producers. No reasons were given for doing so.
The ANC government has also failed to bring onstream many cogeneration projects which could already have been providing thousands of megawatts of power to the grid. This crisis can be solved, but only if we have a government that is committed to creating an electricity industry that allows all players to contribute to the solution. The ANC unfortunately seems more concerned about maintaining its own power than it does about providing power for South Africa. I thank you. [Applause.]