‘Instant gratification’ is an ANC addiction that it has us teetering on the brink of a blackout

[View in browser]( [Mail & Guardian]( M&G Mornings | Thu 19 Jan   There must have been a turning point when the world chose to focus on the short-term prospects of a company or a country instead of the long-term. Maybe it was the 1998 emerging market crisis or the collapse of US energy giant Enron at the start of this century — but there was a point when markets and, in truth, everyone got fixated on their immediate prospects, ala instant gratification. We so regularly dismiss this fix as something applicable only to a generation born in the 2000s (Generation Z), but let’s be honest – all spheres of society are pretty much in the same boat. The Asian crisis and the collapse of a corrupt Enron enterprise brought about an era of tighter scrutiny on the immediate. Now this focus has fed into increased transparency, but it has drawbacks too. It has seen the remuneration of executives explode, whilst at the same time cutting the life-span of companies around the world. I’d bet we aren’t going to see many 100-year-old corporations over this next century. On the political front, politicians in Luthuli House to Matthew Parker Street in London have immersed themselves in the dark art of populism, given its short-term benefit — staying in power. I found myself considering our need for instant gratification when thinking about the ANC’s almost 30-year management of one of its most important jobs — the energy transition centred on Eskom. With such a long runway, you’d have imagined that the governing party would have been in the best position to put in place and stick to a coherent long-term plan to map out generation expansion plans that were put on its table as far back as 1997. Yet, here we are 25 years later, facing a storm that was long forecast by minds much smarter than you and I. Why couldn’t the party emulate the “famed” economic planning model of the Chinese Communist Party over the past three to four decades? What has made this near impossible for the ANC is the functioning of its own “internal” democracy — where the victor gets the spoils of the biggest public purse on the continent. In practice, this has fed the drug of “short-termism”, where the ANC’s most compromised cadres have focused on amassing as much personal gain from their seats given the limited amount of time they are there. It’s about what benefit can be wielded in the shortest amount of time — instant gratification — which is always selfish in nature. They have long forgotten the discipline of long-term planning, which has given rise to “populist” policy choices that has seen energy policy chop and change with every new president and in turn minister responsible for anything related to the expansion of South Africa’s energy market. It has left Eskom drifting, and the rest of the country with an as yet not clearly articulated “just energy transition”. This week, the Mail & Guardian will try to put together an all-encompassing story of the country’s journey to a critical shortage of electricity — and all the people who played a part. Speak to you soon … Ron Derby | Editor-in-Chief [@RonDerby]( [Higher electricity tariffs stand in the way of inflation normalising in 2023]( Reserve Bank’s inflation forecast likely to be pushed up, with Eskom set to increase the price of electricity by 18.65% from April Join thousands of South Africans who want a more just South Africa. Read past party lines, past the bluster and the distortion. Get the best reporting, analysis and commentary that is factual, balanced and fair with uninterrupted access to all Mail & Guardian content online. 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