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Cape Town – The Eskom War Room excludes trade unions and civil society organisations representing those hardest hit by the power crisis, former Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said on Friday.
In an address to the Civil Society Conference on the Electricity Crisis on Friday, Vavi said the working class and the poor are bearing the brunt of the crisis yet, in his view, their voices have been silenced.
READ: Zuma in denial over SA rot, says Vavi
“They are locked out of the so-called War Room which has been set up under Deputy-President Cyril Ramaphosa to try to solve Eskom’s problems.
“It does not include trade unions or any other civil society organisations, just government officials from Department of Public Enterprises, Department of Energy, Treasury and representatives from Business Unity South Africa,” he said.
In December 2014 Minister in the Presidency Jeff Radebe announced a five-point plan to deal with the electricity crisis and the establishment of what was termed a War Room to implement it.
READ: Cabinet sets up 'war room' for Eskom
Working class solution
According to Vavi, the Conference on Electricity aims to develop a working class and community response to the crisis for all those voices that have been excluded from the Eskom War Room, and to research, plan and struggle for a working class solution.
“Unless we develop an alternative worker and community agenda for sorting out the electricity mess and then set up a structure to campaign for its implementation, the consequences will be dire.
“As well as the immediate power crisis, we must advance long-term solutions that will provide universal access to renewable and environmentally sustainable energy, including from water, wind and the sun, and distributed by a publicly owned and accountable utility,” he said.
Vavi also highlighted the unemployment crisis in relation to Eskom, and drew from data recently published by Statistics SA in its quarterly labour force survey.
READ: SA's unemployment rate hits 12-year high
“The campaign must also relate the Eskom crisis to the broader crisis in a society in which unemployment, by the more realistic expanded rate which includes those who have given up looking for work, now stands at 36.1%, 1.5% higher than in the last quarter of 2014.
“This means that 8.7 million South Africans who are able to work cannot do so and join the ranks of the 54.3% of South Africans living in poverty,” he said.
ALSO READ: Vavi: SA teetering on a knife-edge
