The City has been putting pressure on National Government for many years to reshape the energy regime in South Africa to the benefit of its residents and businesses to enable cleaner and more affordable sources of energy to be added to the mix and to promote local government energy planning.
The City contends it is its constitutional mandate to provide power to its customers, allowing those customers to choose the type of power they receive. This must of course be done in accordance with a nationally accepted framework and spirit of intergovernmental collaboration. "The Regulations allow a municipality to apply to the Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy for a determination in terms of Section 34 of the Electricity Regulation Act and require that this determination must be made in accordance with the national Integrated Resource Plan for electricity," said Mayor Dan Plato.
"Over the years, the City had attempted to resolve the matter inter-governmentally, unfortunately to no avail. In addition, the Centre for Environmental Rights has joined the matter as an amicus curiae, in support of the City," said Plato.