LETTER: De Ruyter’s silence has to end

On February 2 2020 then newly appointed Eskom head André de Ruyter publicly set himself a target of 18 months to end the country’s persistent load-shedding. Two and a half years on and the situation has worsened to the point of catastrophe.  

I’m now tired of giving De Ruyter yet another chance, and of defending him. If he’s being white-anted, undermined or defiantly sabotaged by elements in his own organisation (which he surely is), he needs to tell us about it, name them and explain what he’s going to do to fix it.

If he’s being sidelined by the ANC, he needs to speak up. If he’s being hung out to dry by mineral resources & energy minister Gwede Mantashe or President Cyril Ramaphosa and whatever else pretends to be ANC “leadership”, he needs to find his voice and say so, and put the blame right back where it all belongs: on the ANC.

But this debilitating silence, this year-in, year-out tedium of ever worsening power cuts accompanied by badly written media statements and ever more impotent commitments to “do better”, has to end. Or he must just switch off the little power that’s left and be done with it.

Meanwhile, as the country has just staggered through another brutal weekend of power cuts, Ramaphosa has fortunately avoided such inconveniences by gallivanting with US President Joe Biden in the US, and then royalty in the UK. 

And of course, every cabinet minister and deputy, including Mantashe, avoids the devastating rolling blackouts by using the nifty taxpayer-funded diesel generators installed at their homes. Not for them the inconveniences the hoi polloi must endure. It’s as if they’re saying to us: “Suck it up, serfs!”

Mark Lowe, Durban

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