Well said Lupercus~~ I totally agree with you! You have said it without predilection. I wish Business Report can relay your comment to politicians so that they can go back to the drawing board and make amends accordingly. Bessie Head was once asked why she became a writer/jounalist instead of a politician, since most of her books had political proclivity, and this was her response: " My world opposes the world of politicians because they plan for and dictate to the people but in my world people plan for themselves and dictate their ideas to me" quote unquote. This Bantu ba se Mzansi, Suid Afrikaanse mense, Ma Afrika borwa, fellow South Africans.... is democracy in its abundance i.e goverment by the people and for the people.

The only commonsense solution - reject the request before it becomes a bi-annual occurrence. George Bernard Shaw once said "Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that man can never learn anything from history." South African politicians have learned nothing by studying the events to the north. Every country that gained it's "freedom from oppression and colonialism" immediately proceeded to oppress not only their own people, but also all those who had helped build the country, whatever the colour of their skins. The arrogance of our political leaders (of all parties) is unbelievable. As my daddy used to say "They ain't worth feeding, son". The parastatals are falling apart simply because the ruling party felt they had to reward the so called "comrades" for their efforts in gaining "freedom". We have incompetents in every government department in our country (both at local and national level). As one of my colleagues put it, "It's not so much that they don't know, it's the fact that they don't know they don't know". Now Tokyo has placed "one of his private jets" at the disposal of his deputy. My God, how many private jets does he have? And how did he earn them?? As we now know - "We have an economy that is more and more based on unproductive people exchanging money with other unproductive people “ Let's face it, the ANC had better read the Freedom Charter again, get rid of the incompetents and promote people to position of responsibility on expertise and experience alone - forget the skin colour. If the person is black and meets all the criteria - appoint that person. Skin colour is no indication of a person’s ability, intelligence or integrity. So stop depriving those who deserve the top positions simply because of skin colour or political leanings. Get rid of the idiots trying to run the SAA, Eskom, Armscor, etc and appoint people with the ability and expertise to perform. Otherwise, look north my friends and learn a little but from history for a change.

@J.Z. Vuka - have you been living in a complete news blackout the last few years? What you're saying is old news... And Eskom doesn't need to increase tariffs by 2x to 3x as they can approach international finance institutions for assistance, the reason they want to do increase tariffs first is that they can then finance the construction without being indebted and can therefore return to profitability ASAP. So Eskom then becomes profitable at the expense of SA's economy...

It takes a lot more than a fancy education and a fancy suit to make a man worthy of commanding respect from fellow workers. It seems that many of those appointed to senior posts are under the impression that the title they bear entitles them to do as they please; that they are above the law. The need to thoroughly investigate and test those who are possible candidates for high-ranking positions; this even before only probational appointment is even considered, should be very firmly entrenched. There is no way; this particularly in the current, complex South African political and corporate climate, that the situation can be handled in any other way. Recommendations or referrals alone should not be considered as adequate proof of capability. Strictly, on trial only, before a firm appointment! - Thereafter, only performance-based rewards. Imagine the true Corporate groups being managed by parastatals? ? ?

Someone has to pay - now it will be the few taxpayers rather than the many consumers

okay... but if we go back to rolling blackouts, we know where to blame. [i can see maroga saying "i told you so" from here.]

to double the prices in 3 years is still not good...JG

Well, hopefully, there is light at the end of the tunnel:-)

I am not an ESKOM employee neither am I affiliated to ESKOM in any way, form, shape or figure but I am a South African citizen born and bred here. In my opinion the estimation/expectation of Eskom hike plan being rebuffed is not good news at all nor is it what the country needs at this stage, and I know most people will be at a variance with me because no one is willing to spend money in such times. Rumour has it that our goverment was made aware that there's a need for establishment of more power stations but they(goverment of that time) did not find it worthwhile for more stations to be built at that stage, nevertheless/apparently funds were allocated so that when they see a need for more power stations there would be funds. Should this be a verity then I wonder what happened to those funds whcih were allocated for times as these? We cannot be sitting on this question cos it will not provide us with electricity, let us (without prejudice) help Eskom in ensuring that it supplies electricity to the people of Southern Africa and for this to be done the hike plan has to be approved. Our government should also play a role in this i.e if Eskom wants a 40% increase, in view of the fact that the electricity is high as it is now then the state should find a subsidy for the consumers.

Good news, but will the "load shedding" all of sudden come back again, I mean the last one came because Eskom didn't get the hike they wanted too. So we had all the "maintenance".