EFF deputy leader Floyd Shivambu.
- The EFF proposes a deal with Russian state energy company, Rosatom, to resolve the energy crisis.
- Floyd Shivambu favours Karpowership and other Floating Storage Regasification Units from China and Russia to provide energy relief.
- The energy crisis featured prominently on the second day of the SONA debate.
Among the EFF’s proposals to address South Africa’s energy crisis is a deal with Russian state nuclear energy company, Rosatom.
The energy crisis featured prominently on Wednesday, the second day of the debate on President Cyril Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) in the Cape Town City Hall.
ANC MPs lauded Ramaphosa’s plan and complained that opposition parties were “politicking”, but opposition parties blamed the crisis on the ANC and criticised the government’s response.
EFF chief whip Floyd Shivambu presented a range of measures, which he said should be introduced to end load shedding and obtain energy security.
“We need to approve the proposal by Rosatom – the Rosatom power station and nuclear energy company, which currently provides more than 20% of electricity in the Russian Federation.
“It employs more than 250 000 people. It has been here in South Africa, saying ‘why don’t you give us a power purchase agreement like your big, like your friends from the west, and build up to 6 000 megawatts of nuclear energy, which everyone else allows and agrees is part of clean energy sources’,” Shivambu said.
READ | Russia’s Rosatom remains ‘interested vendor’ as SA revives nuclear build
“That is one of the things that needs to be done in the immediate [future].”
Shivambu also favours Turkish company, Karpowership, to provide energy relief.
He said South Africa approved Karpowership to “plug in 1 200 megawatts” into the grid.
“But due to those who are seeking bribes, those who are trying to extort the people who awarded that bid, the Karpowerships cannot be plugged into the grid, to now ameliorate the energy crisis that we have,” Shivambu said, while Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe stroked his goatee.
“The reality is that, in the immediate, you have got no other solution except plugging in FSRUs [Floating Storage Regasification Units] from Turkey, from China and from the Russian Federation.
Shivambu said:
We know that you [the ANC] are going to be out of power. We are going to take power as the EFF. We don’t want to take power under darkness.
During his speech, Shivambu referred to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year as “necessary military operations in Ukraine”.
The EFF had also advocated that South Africa should procure and dispense Russia’s Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine during the coronavirus pandemic.
In 2018, the courts put an end to the Zuma administration’s proposed nuclear deal with Russia, which could have crippled South Africa financially.
WATCH | Mantashe bats for Karpowership (again): ‘We don’t have the luxury to choose’
Rosatom was seen as a leading candidate to clinch the 9 600 megawatt deal.
Similarly, the Karpowership deal, part of a 2 000 MW Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (RMI4P), has been delayed by litigation amid accusations of tender-rigging.
Ramaphosa will respond to the debate on Thursday afternoon.
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