The Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Energy, Fikile Majola, says the committee will work together with the Department of Energy to build its capacity and enable the department to respond to the energy challenges in South Africa.

Majola spoke to SAnews on Tuesday after the committee sat in a meeting with the department to receive updates on the Renewable Energy Power Producers Programme (REPPP).

“The issues that were raised in the meeting from both the portfolio committee and the department centred around building the capacity of the department,” he said.

During the meeting, the department’s Acting Director-General Wolsey Barnard said the department is reviewing its vision in line with the National Development Plan (NDP) vision for the energy sector.

Barnard said a New Household Electrification Strategy was approved by Cabinet last year to address electrification backlogs and ensure universal access.

“A budget of R3 574 799 billion was appropriated for the electrification programme in 2013/14. R2 141 027 of the amount was allocated to Eskom, R1 314 772 to Municipalities and Non-Grid R119 000,” Barnard said.

He said a total of 306 773 households were connected during the 2013/14 financial year comprising 292 714 grid and 14 059 non-grid connections.

“More than 70% of the funding was allocated to the 24 most deprived district municipalities,” said Barnard.

Challenges affecting the department

Meanwhile, Barnard said the department faced various challenges, including reducing escalating energy prices of both electricity and petroleum products “to cushion the adverse effects on the poor”.

He said the department needed to find a solution to finance various projects to balance the increasing electricity tariff, as well as deal with blackouts and stunted economic growth due to lack of adequate power generation capacity.

“The other challenge is to provide a short term of immediate power solution that will assist the country to meet the current energy demand, until Medupi, Kusile and Ingula pump storage are fully operational,” Barnard said.

Barnard said the department was allocated R320 million to run a pilot on addressing electricity distribution backlogs.

He said additional funding has been requested from National Treasury to address issues of planning, project management, oversight activities and infrastructure.

Barnard said the department has since its establishment focused on ensuring that its policies and policy implementing instruments address issues of energy security, energy access, economic access, economic growth, environmental sustainability and sector transformation.

He added that the department and its entities have received unqualified audit reports from the Auditor-General.

Vacant posts

Among the issues that were raised by members of the portfolio committee was that the department needed to fill  a number of vacant posts in management level, and middle management.

Thandi Mahambehlala, who is one of the members of the portfolio committee, said women needed to be at top management in the department, not middle-management.

“This department is led by a woman Minister and Deputy Minister. They were not chosen because of their beauty, but because of their hard work. In here, we have women who are capable and qualified… we need more women Deputy Director-Generals to fill up the vacant posts,” she said.

She also said the department needed to employ more staff members and make sure that those it has trained do not leave the department for private sector posts, like it was indicated in the meeting.

She said if the need arises to promote an employee who received training from the department, from level 8 to 11, requests should be done, to avoid losing valuable staff members to the private sector.