South Africa Scraps Electricity State of Disaster After Lawsuits

(Bloomberg) — South Africa’s government withdrew a state of disaster imposed two months ago to deal with the nation’s energy crisis after civil-rights groups filed lawsuits challenging the move. 

President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the state of disaster Feb. 10 to help deal with power outages that have been imposed by the nation’s beleaguered state electricity utility Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. The measure enabled the government to bypass regulatory hurdles as it sought to repair broken power plants and procure emergency electricity to end blackouts that have extended to as long as 12 hours a day.

The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse and labor union Solidarity opposed the declaration in court, saying the government had enough powers to deal with the crisis. The administration said it was scrapping the state of disaster because it had achieved its objective, including the appointment of a minister of electricity.

“The state of disaster enabled government to enhance interventions by the National Energy Crisis Committee,” the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs said in a statement on Wednesday. It helped the government come up with a plan to accelerate private investment and increase procurement, and hence the decision to terminate the state of emergency, the department said.  

Rotational blackouts — locally known as loadshedding — have continued every week this year in South Africa.

“All the instruments that are needed to solve the energy crisis have been in the government’s hands for years,” Solidarity Chief Executive Officer Dirk Hermann said in a statement. “The government’s incompetence or unwillingness to use those instruments is the greater disaster.”

News that the state of disaster is being withdrawn coincided with a separate announcement by the government that it’s scrapping an exemption granted to Eskom from reporting irregular spending in its annual financial statements, after a public outcry against the move.