President Cyril Ramaphosa says he is “actively involved” in resolving the impasse between industry and the department of energy over the 10MW cap that has been set for firms that wish to generate their own energy.
He also wants telecoms firms to settle their legal battles with the government regulator to enable the auction of broadband spectrum to proceed.
The two economic reforms — enabling self-generation of electricity and freeing up broadband spectrum — are key to the government’s growth strategy and have been on his agenda since Ramaphosa took office in February 2018.
The two issues also top the checklists of investors and ratings agencies in assessing SA’s progress towards an improved environment for growth.
Embedded generation, or self-generation, in which firms, farms and mines build their own renewable energy power plants, is accepted as the quickest way to alleviate SA’s energy constraints and bring more megawatts onto the grid.
A proposal by mineral resources & energy minister Gwede Mantashe that the size of plants be limited to 10MW or go through a licensing process has been challenged by business as arbitrary and unnecessary.
Business argues that the licensing process by the National Energy Regulator of SA is arduous and time-consuming. The proposal is open for public comment, which closes on Friday. Ramaphosa, who was speaking to journalists after concluding his budget vote in parliament on Thursday, said now that the consultation process is almost concluded there would be “consideration of the position we should take.
“There is a clear, clear indication that people want to go beyond [the 10MW] and that there will be takers to go beyond. We have to look at the various proposals on the table. I’m actively involved in how we can best resolve the limitation of megawatts,” he said.
Ramaphosa said he was also pushing for a mediated settlement with telecoms companies, which have taken the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) to court.
This has stalled the long-awaited auction of new broadband spectrum, which had been expected to take place by the end of March.
Telkom has interdicted the entire auction from proceeding, while MTN has launched litigation over the packaging of spectrum and the limitations placed on parties to bid for them.
“There is a need to settle that legal process. I have called on all partners, all stakeholders, that rather than wait for a year or two there is a need for all of us to work together to put the needs of all South Africans ahead of our own corporate singular interests. I would like them to engage, there should be mediation where agreement is reached so that Icasa can go ahead with the auction,” he said.
Ramaphosa said his economic reform programme is on track even if it has been slower than anticipated.
“Granted, because of the slowness of reforms there are those who have said we would like to see more speed in moving ahead and that is precisely what we are doing.
“This administration is about reforming things that went wrong in the past and putting them right. On that we can’t be faulted, it is only the speed, but on policy positions we are very clear that we need to reposition this country,” he said.
Questioned whether he plans to reshuffle his cabinet soon and whether he is happy with the performance of his ministers, Ramaphosa said he has no announcement to make at this stage.
He is looking at how well the configuration of cabinet has worked, and whether the right departments have been grouped together. However, he had no plan to “migrate to a smaller cabinet” any time soon.
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