I’m sure I must be at least the thousandth person to write something like this.

Load shedding hit us today again and our office was plunged into (somewhat) darkness. Luckily our management have managed to implement some sort of power generation system so at least we not be totally unproductive as I noticed some of the other businesses in the area were at this time.

It really made me quite sad as I drove into the petrol station, the pumps were all off, and the petrol attendants left twiddling their thumbs thanks to another parastatal. It made me sad because, the poor staff are losing out of an eight our shift, two and a half hours worth of their tips, which I’m sure makes up an important part of their income. Also, the company hiring these staff will probably feel the effects of lost sales and will end up retrenching some of their staff, its a vicious circle.

The theme is all too similar. Another one of our beloved monopoly’s, maybe not as visible as the current load shedding takes the focus. Of course I’m talking about Telkom. Telkom has been riding the South African public for years and continues to do so as no end is in sight of their exorbitant prices and unreliable service.

These two companies, if things go the way they are now, are going to cost the South African economy a whole pile of money. We can already see from the various news articles around that international investors and international businesses with South African offices are seriously starting to reconsider their future investment in this country.

It just annoys me immensely, after all the hard work that was done to get international business confidence in South Africa to this point, and now it is basically lost after a few weeks of sporadic power cuts.

Apparently the government is to blame for Eskom too, so can I ask a favour? I pay enormous amounts of tax every month, so can I get a discount for the following things goverment has failed to supply me:

  • Education
  • Security
  • Health care
  • Electricity infrastructure
  • Cost related telecommunications

I’m really tired of supplying them (where I’m allowed to) my self, and I could use the money.