President Cyril Ramaphosa has ended his meeting with Eskom’s board and executive management where he was briefed on the power utility’s plans to mitigate and resolve the current electricity crisis affecting the country.
READ: Ramaphosa in a rush home to resolve Eskom crisis
The president was received by Minister of Public Enterprises, Pravin Gordhan and Eskom Board Chairperson, Jabu Mabuza at Eskom’s Megawatt Park headquarters in Sandton after a meeting with his Deputy President David Mabuza and Mineral Resources Minister Gwede Mantashe earlier this morning in anticipation of his visit to Eskom.
Khusela Diko, Spokesperson to the President says Ramaphosa cut his international trip to Egypt short in order to attend to the crisis at Eskom because he appreciates that the intermittent supply of electricity is an emergency.
“He felt that it was necessary for him not to do the second half of his trip to Egypt and to come back and to engage as he is currently doing with the board and management of Eskom. He wants to understand, firstly, how did we get here given what had been done to try and stabilise the system and to look at what is our long term recovery plan to move forward.”
Diko says both operational and governance challenges at Eskom were discussed in the meeting with Minister Mantashe bringing the need to add energy capacity to the president’s attention. While she would not reveal when the president would brief the nation on the outcome of the meeting, she says such an address can be expected soon.
“What we can expect is for the president to give us an update as to where they are in terms of what needs to be done. It is in everybody’s interest – that is the president as well as the rest of the country.”
Ramaphosa is expected to visit flood victims in Tembisa and Mamelodi for the rest of the day. Eskom is currently implementing Stage 2 rotational load shedding until 23:00 tonight.