There has, most obviously, been a great deal of hoo-hah surrounding Eskom. Almost on a daily basis emails have been received, debates on radio have taken place and news items have been endured. Mostly this just irritates me. I consider signing the petition, I try to listen to the debates, I even waste five minutes of my life watching the news items. But still I cannot help but think that it’s really pointless. We live in a democratic country but honestly what exactly does democracy mean in reality!?! Eskom is a business and as such it does not care what we the public want, it cares what its board of directors want. And they want profit. They also want to continue receiving those fat bonus cheques and 27% raises per annum. TWENTY-SEVEN percent! Could this perhaps be where all our money is going? We know it’s not going towards maintenance because we are still experiencing “load shedding”. Only now it’s actual “power failures” as most of the electricity giving equipment is just simply giving out. It’s old and tired and just cannot handle the pressure of working any more. Especially considering no-one at Eskom has thought it prudent to put pro-active measures in place ensuring the upkeep of their equipment. No, they were too busy agreeing to ridiculous amounts for raises & bonus cheques, patting themselves on the back for the huge profits they have made off us. All that congratulations takes a fair amount of time.
But what really irritates me, what really makes my hair stand on end and my teeth grind together is the annoying little lectures we have to endure from the Eskom fat cats about what naughty little children we, the customers, are.
First we were told in no uncertain terms, that due to the fact that we, the customer, did not listen to Eskom, the parent, and stop wasting electricity we were to be punished. After all, when your child does not heed you and continues to behave in an unacceptable manner, we the parent must show them who the boss is. We cannot let the little brats get the impression we can be walked all over. The only problem I see here is that Eskom is our service provider. We pay their salaries; they do not feed us, house us, clothe us or educate us. They are not our parent. We are their customer. So therefore shouldn’t we dictate the terms of our relationship!?! Oops I forgot they have a MONOPOLY.
So after all this we endured Load Shedding. Hundreds of business went bankrupt, grocery stores lost millions due to spoilt foods; basically our entire economy took a huge knock just so that we, the errant child, would learn our lesson.
Before I continue my rant let me just say that I have no problem with reducing my electricity consumption. I also have no problem with finding alternate power, like say wind power, solar power or any other green alternatives there may be. In fact why doesn’t Eskom put something in place? Install solar panels in my block of flats; make me pay a rental every month for the annual upkeep of the panels and a monthly fee for the costs incurred from the installation of said panels. I have no problem with this at all. It will work out cheaper for me in the long run as solar power is far cheaper than nuclear power, better for the environment and… it’s free, the sun always shines in Durban. Oh wait, it wouldn’t be profitable enough for Eskom and we have those 27% raises and bonus cheques to think about, silly me, I forgot the most important thing.
We survived Load Shedding, Eskom obviously decided we had been punished long enough and had learnt our lesson, we were then told we must reduce our consumption by 10% otherwise Load Shedding would be back. So we, the good child, reduced our consumption by 10%, but what happened next? Eskom released their numbers and it was discovered that they had not made enough money and because we, the naughty child, had not spent enough with them we would then have to endure further punishment and our rates would be increased, we are now paying 46% more for electricity per month. I suppose this 46% increase in tarrifs was to cover the 27% increase in salary the fat cats at Eskom just received.
Through all of this we have also been told that South Africa enjoys the benefit of the cheapest electricity globally, which is great, except for one little fact, only a third of our country actually enjoys this benefit, the rest don’t even have electricity. Can you imagine if the whole of SA was able to enjoy the benefit, then we would really be screwed, Eskom cannot even supply the third with enough electricity; what on earth would they do if they actually had to supply the whole?
And now we are told we will have to endure a further 60% increase in tarrifs, to cover maintenance costs, 27% salary increases per annum and million rand bonus cheques for the fat cats. I am sick of Eskom. South African’s battle to keep up with the rising costs of food, never mind the rising cost of petrol, gas, school fees, insurances and now electricity. Eskom were responsible for thousands of people losing their lively hood and still they can enjoy the benefit of 27% salary increases. This is not only irresponsible it’s robbery. I wouldn’t mind so much if the tea lady at Eskom received a 27% salary increase, I would be happy with that, she probably needs it more. I do have a problem with the fat cat who received a million rand bonus cheque last year also receiving a 27% salary increase this year. I also have a problem with Eskom getting away with day light robbery, putting more strain on our economy and basically bankrupting poor South African citizens who don’t have any chose but to bend over and take it like a man.
Dear Eskom,
I will be investigating alternate power supplies in the hopes that one day I will be able to get my one thousand, three hundred and fifty Rand deposit back from you. In the hopes that I will be able to tell you to shove it where the sun don’t shine, because I no longer need you, your ridiculous reasons for taking food off my child’s plate and pathetically disguised excuses for increasing already over paid director salaries so they can enjoy long over seas holidays, three million rand houses and private schools for their off spring.
Eskom you are the devil and do not deserve the R600 I pay every month for my two bedroom, one bathroom, no pool, no tumble dryer home.
Signed with absolutely no Kind Regards by an irate, sick of it consumer with currently no choice.
bravo
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