'Energy crisis a turning point'

2008-04-24 23:02

Johannesburg - The energy crisis gripping South Africa this year is a turning point, an adversity presenting opportunity, ANC president Jacob Zuma said on Thursday.

Addressing a business breakfast at the Royal Africa Society and Commonwealth in London, Zuma said business leaders he met had raised concerns over the issue.

"We view the crisis as a turning point. For us, adversity presents opportunities. Government has a viable plan to manage the energy situation in the short, medium and long term," Zuma said.

"We will surely emerge from this crisis with a population and industrial sector that uses electricity in an environmentally friendly way.

"The investor community should see opportunities rather than risks as we are convinced that there will be a turnaround."

South Africa's energy crisis has resulted in scheduled power cuts across the country and according to economists, this has already affected the country's economic growth.

Zuma assured business leaders there were several measures in place to deal with the situation - including re-opening power stations, emergency teams dealing with coal supplies, and building new coal-fired power stations, set to be up and running by 2012.

Outages ?wreaked havoc?

He acknowledged that the scheduled power outages imposed by Eskom had "wreaked havoc" on South African industries.

"We have heard the concerns of investors in the mining and other industries about the impact of such outages. We have said that we will ensure continuity from the current administration to the new government next year in terms of policy and programmes."

While stating that there would not be any shifts in policy under this new administration, Zuma said there was a need for a "new way of doing things".

"We also said we do not anticipate policy changes as the policies we adopted in Polokwane will be valid until the next conference in 2012.

"However, there will need to be a new way of doing things in government in order to improve service delivery. One of these is to improve our planning capacity so that we can be able to avoid problems such as the energy crisis we are facing," he said.

Cosatu, a close Zuma ally, has repeatedly called for the current government to take responsibility for the energy crisis, which the union federation believed could have been avoided.

Zuma said better co-ordination of economic and social planning in all three spheres of government - local, provincial and national - was necessary.

Uniform public service

"This would also apply to development finance institutions and state-owned enterprises.

"We also clearly need to overhaul the capacity of our public service. We envisage a uniform public service and high entrance-requirements and an effective performance management system for senior public servants."

He, however, assured leaders that the transition from the current government to the next would be smooth.

"There should not be apprehension or uncertainty about how the process will unfold.

"The democratic future of the country is very secure, regardless of which ANC collective is in leadership at any time," he said.

Economy

On the economy, the man poised to take the reins from current President Thabo Mbeki, who has been hailed for turning the country's economy around, said the ruling party had a "clear programme of action for the next five years.

"We will consolidate the gains we have made... including our reputation of fiscal prudence and responsible macro-economic management.

"We will in the next five years invest resources more vociferously in social transformation and the improvement of service delivery.

Zuma reiterated his stance on crime, saying tougher measures and more visible action was needed to combat it.

Measures put forward by the ANC president included the creation of a single police force where all municipal and traffic police services across the country would fall under the command of the National Police Commissioner.

"In our vision for a total overhaul of the criminal justice system, we also envisage increasing the capacity of the judicial system to process the cases and for our prisons or correctional services to incarcerate violent criminals preventing prison escapes.

"We assure you that these are matters that we are looking at very seriously," he said.

Zim: 'Have faith'

He said the handling of the March 29 Zimbabwean election left "much to be desired".

"It is unacceptable to withhold election results; it is tantamount to sabotaging the democratic process. However we remain confident that the Zimbabweans, assisted by SADC, will find a solution to this impasse. Our message to you is, have faith."

Zuma expressed confidence that the impasse in that southern African country would be resolved and urged the business community to look to the future.

The revival of the Zimbabwean economy was critical and the business leaders would be "key partners in that project".

South Africa was also developing a strategy to deal with the influx of Zimbabweans crossing into the country.

"It should be a humane and progressive approach, but one which obviously does not overstretch our resources and infrastructure."

- SAPA