a huge natural decision by the nicaragua government, however added it was also the product of concerted american diplomacy, and that the channels of communication were open between the 2 countries. the action opens the door to discussion of other matters of mutual concern. united states remains committed to a dialogue with the government of rug, well unused in other matters and will continue to support a nicaraguan. it's not clear yet whether they tones may lead the members of the nicaraguan government and will take it as his family are under sanction. by the u. s. government chamber town. see al jazeera washington. i'm going to forget, you can find lots more on the websites, pictures on background to all these stories. the address for that is all just 0. don't com ah, this is all. these are the top stories more than 4 days. passions to powerful earthquakes hit to clear and syria. over 23000 people have been reported dead

across both countries. rescue teams continue to dig through the rubble searching for survivors often by hand freezing temperature as a snow of slowing down the reference or so. saudi has moved from new car, mama rush, they set the center of the disaster blocks off the blocks apartments off the apartments have collapsed here in the city of god, among mirage. it was hit twice in 9 hours. now. emmy, fond of one of the blogs that is completely leveled down here. and you can see that distribution is quite quality here. the rest, your force are tramping the heavy lifting machineries the vehicles are still working, rescue teams are, are working relentlessly. i've ever, they are running out of the time. so these buildings collect buildings right over there is almost a fresh graveyard. at least 2 people, including a 6 year old child have been killed and

a ramming attack in the occupies westbank. the driver reportedly targeted people waiting at a bus stop is illegal israeli settlements over. i'm off. russia has launched a wave of missile attacks across ukraine. these images from the region itself, alicia show the destruction in the area. several energy facilities and other buildings were reportedly head. thousands of people in democratic republic of congo have fled their homes as m. 23 fighters close in on the eastern town of saki, a con galleys army and the on group have been fighting in the area since monday. the towns and the east of the country on the main road to the countries, the 2nd biggest city of gama. more than 220 political prisoners have been released from jail in nicaragua and flown to the u. s. but it had agro and judiciary said the prisoners were traitors were being deported. president daniel ortega was detained dozens of opponents to his government in recent years, including several people who intended to run against him in the 2021 presidential

election. and these are the headlines to don't forget more details as always on the website al jazeera dot com coming up next an al jazeera. it's the story. goodbye touchy money into african good exclusive al jazeera investigation coming soon. good with. welcome to the stream. i managed tab it deemed for nearly 100 consecutive days, there had been rolling blackouts in south africa, her country grappling with an energy crisis that had can't seem to shake in response. the president has declared a state of disaster as a step towards trying to find a resolution. so what will it take to and the energy crisis in south africa? well, let start. today's conversation with a video sent to us from a small business owner in johannesburg. the rolling part, black,

also unpredictable, so you can't even plan according to them. sometimes they only have 4 hours of electricity a day. and that means that we have to now get our people to work over time. we have to bring in part time people to come in during the hours in re, to have power in yet you still have to pay a hefty amount every month for the $3.00 phase industrialist tricity supply. whether you use it or not, have to increase security and transport costs to drive our people home if they have to work overnight. and our fulfillment rate is at 50 percent. now, because we're not able to fulfill all of our orders on time, and that means we leave a lot of money on the table. and that means you can have to take cost cutting measures, such as letting people go or cutting out production lines. joining us to discuss from johannesburg pa camila slew be my jolla spokesperson for the national union of metal workers of south africa. also in johannesburg, jacob moraga director of erin knight energy, and former c. e o of ascom, and also with us from pretoria energy expert, who, se malaise say, ah,

thank you so much for being with us. and of course we also want you to join the conversation. so be sure to share your thoughts and questions directly with us on youtube. so i want to start by talking about who's being impacted. i mean, businesses are closing daily tasks. we hear like cooking or charging a phone in south africa. requiring planning and economists are warning of a recession. who say, how are you being impacted by this? oh, this impacts on every why i'm really including myself. as their energy, as you know, is an input and critical input to the corner me where they is, hospitals, wastewater treatment to x, that impacts on the water supply. is there industrial uses individuals at home? i mean, i'm sitting yet some way in an office because my house has been no chair. did that impacts on me that impacts on my business. so it's an impact that is throughout the agricultural sector heavily impact it in terms of irrigation. a,

there isn't really a set has that you can say is not impacted by notating south africa. and that's why i want to try to give our audience a sense of the scale of the problem. just how big a crisis is. it is, as you just did, pa, camila, can you give us a scale in your, in your mind of who's most affected and why the crisis feels like it's deepening. oh, this is a terrible crisis that is engulfed south africa. and it, in our view, is if, if this continues this crisis of low cheating, we are going to see increased a civil unrest just because of the fact that the massive, massive job cuts taking place in south africa at the, at the, at the moment. and this deepens, unemployment, poverty inequality. we've already had social unrest happening about 23 years ago. so this is just going to deepen that,

that kind of tension and the frustration that the, the masses are feeling at the moment because of the impact. i mean, it's affecting all areas of south africa yesterday when we held a press conference, we were talking not just about the costs about a 1000000000 random day, but health workers that will complaining about the fact that patients are dying on the table when the machine's golf so it really is a crisis i'm, you know, when we talk about this crisis, a lot of people in our youtube chat also trying to pinpoint for us, or what they think is the route of the problem cosmic wake saying to us, the privatization of energy generation is the root cause of the problem. now, jacob, i want to share with you. i know you're familiar with these facts, but also for our viewers. some quick kind of facts about the energy situation in the country. more than 90 percent of the countries power is generated by the state utility. s. com. the daily power shortfall,

if you can imagine 40026000 megawatts as comes debt is approaching 400000000000 ran . that's $25000000000.00 in 2022. there were $207.00 days with power cuts, and now the country is nearing a 100 consecutive days of blackouts. jacob, if you have to explain this to us as an engineer, if you will, and someone you know, 1st hand with 1st time experience, i should say of as calm. what do you think is the fault in the system? why is this happening? well, the direct cause of the problem is the performance of generation code. and then the measure that he use day is number called energy availability, sector and ordinarily or the target. it's bob said it in a, but you know, we have, you know, we have come from

a 90 percent performance. now we're below 50. so have you called sleep? half of the time. i'm not available. and that's at the center. the cost you can debate the causes, we can debate what, who's you know, who's to blame. but the technical direct technical problem is we put a fleet that is not performing to expected outputs. and you know, when we look at the conversation today, the president speaking announcing a state of disaster, a lot of critics, you know, suggesting that maybe he's out of touch with the reality of what's happening just to give our audience a sense of what just happened. people time and thing, his decision to appoint a new minister of electricity will guess that as part of job creation as we can see here on twitter. some people poking fun perhaps that that announcement, this is a mean with drake. people thing. route out corruption and criminal elements and

that's come. no, accelerate, implementation of independent power producers. no, but that somehow the minister of electricity is an announcement that's going to solve this problem. what do you make of the sort of criticisms who say and what i may call say it is that i was hoping that the president will consolidate. rather than to have even more structures coming up. because he mentioned that the department of public enterprises will continue with the restructuring jack energy transition. he mentioned that day and a and then the climate a committed that is within these presidency. we'll continue with that jeff energy transition and then we'll take euston. emit your minister of electricity when we have a line functional department that supposed to deal with this. and so in my view and then that's the national electricity, a crisis committee that also seat within the presidency. for me,

i was hoping for more consolidation tens of what is structure that our id be there with their plan that he has put in place to ensure that we accelerate trying to being in the solutions rather than even more stretch. as i mean, the national treasury is going to look at that demand side management interventions was, well, businesses generate as an all subtle thing for me, i was hoping for better consolidation. so better consolidation is what she was hoping for. a puck a, me lay, i want to know how about the, how about you? i mean, just, just to share one more tweet that came, it came online that we thought was noteworthy. san saying so basically he has no solution. useless. and then another one here love that woman saying, who is this president really addressing one most of the country is on the load shedding. now i know you know what load setting as load setting as a term to refer to these outages. these cuts take a look at this graph, i want to share with you about camila. this is a visualization of days with load shedding. so you can see aside from 2016,

2017 increasing since then. and a dramatic increase in 2022 as well as this year, a bucket. me they, what do you make of, of these kind of criticisms of the president and how serious it seems, the government's really taking this. so our perspective as an em sir, has always been that the, this government is not really serious about tackling low cheating. you heard your experts over there, mr. jacob model, who's a former c of s, gone and a bona fide energy expert telling you that our problems are of mismanagement of the maintenance program for the coal fleet. escal and escal itself and his own in its own reports have said that the faster solution to deal with locating tomorrow or or to day is for us to maintain our co fleet so that we can actually ensure that we provide regular electricity. he did not focus on that. what we heard

this evening was a, a more programs to ensure the greater involvement of the private sector in energy generation. yes, he touched on maintenance. he mentioned it. but the focus if you want to resolve lot shitting it quickly, that is the faster solution. and what we've been saying, as mom said, is that this load shedding is deliberate, and we say it's deliberate, because as long as there's no lights, then we can justify the privatization of escal. we shouldn't forget that just a mere full 5 years ago in 202018. in january 2018, president obama pasa appeared before the war. the chronometer forum. he told the delegates there that we were not investing in nuclear because at that time south africa had excess energy. right now, how did we move from excess noel to an inability to provide electricity? and i metals you, i'm out for a month and that from that

a mary or the government that's responsible. yeah. and i don't, i don't with her. you are without exactly the question about were wondering and you also take into effect some contextual figures for audience. they may not know, of course, the 3 of you do know that south africa relies on call for 80 percent of its energy needs. as you heard jacob parker me, they saying this is deliberate. do you agree? i'm curious. well, i wouldn't go. it's deliberate. but let me say, and let me just say 2 things and set consolidation and folks. the problem is at as, and it's a cold feet problem. and if you don't, if you started many other things but confuses the problem, then you don't get the solution. so focused on the real problem, which is the performance. all right, the feet of estimates, the complete consolidated responsibility divide. and it must be clear because we

come from it in the past few months. a t plan where this seems to be a disjuncture between the shareholder ministry and the policy lead time. so you know who's accountable? so, so, so the ok, forgive me, i appreciate you saying where we should be focusing and because you are redirecting our focus. if you will, i'd like to redirect our focus a little bit to the actual impact on human lives. we're doing that for give me jacob. i'll come right back to you, but i want you to listen to what one man at a recent protest in cape town had to say about how much talk there is. but so little action we didn't really tie it. you know, i'm going to the low trading day off today and we want to see that actually speaking, i believe there's a lot of promises. there's a lot of things that people bring within what the government, but we don't see real action being taken. then i think today it does the form of

selling the people and in government that we want to see. change jacob, go ahead, finish your point, but take into consideration that concern that there's so much talk and so little action. yes, you see the problem is that when you put a problem with the cold feet and we know that is the most important solution when you start eating things like, you know, you want to pick the sex in sick consequences. but technically, that is not going to move the needle on your problem and we start talking on, but at least like to the entire supply. when we know that that is a long term project that he's not going to solve so so, so for me, consolidating and focusing on the real problem and empowering the management of s to do whatever it needs to be done to, to,

to turn around the cold feet is the most important. ok? i solution. i'm glad we're talking solutions, but you know, that might make a lot of sense. but what about the people who are actually suffering their lives being interrupted? park me like could you explain to us what that actually looks like maybe for you or for those that you are representing here today? well, am for workers of noon, sir. what that looks like is jobless, because in the manufacturing sector where we have a majority of membership, in fact, cheese and smelters in mining. and in the auto say, turn the motor sector. it means that there's a reduction in production. and when companies are not producing an optimum levels, they, it results in job losses. yesterday we heard painful stories from the health and allied endeavor workers trade union, which is a trade union in south africa representing health care workers. and they say that

when there's low shedding, they have to choose between which patients to manually recitation resuscitate, and which patients to a to let die. and, and this is the situation we're facing. and when you have this sort of life and death situation staring you in the face, and you've got a government of, of so, or i'm a person that can stand before the people, and pontificate about solutions that are not going to solve the problem today. it tells you that these people don't take this crisis serious. yeah. and you know, you say pontificating about the solutions. well, i'm, susie was israel on twitter said honest question. after watching the president, pontiff agape does he even live in the same country as us? now that may be tongue in cheek, but i think it does highlight the disconnect that people feel. we also see that in you tube people timing into this conversation. for example, just in my berg saying, we export our electricity to namibia and las soto, but we can't provide for our own country, make it make sense. well, to people who do make sense, let's listen to what some,

a farmers have to say about the energy crisis and what you are outlining just how it affects their livelihoods. we are coming out of 67 draws. then it was covert now with the leg of lack of bell wouldn't energy and some commodity. some farmers just tell me i can't go on like that. they must make a call on the gun, leave the forms of something that the blood shooting considering think will been this will lose a lot of the possible. did you fall off them? honest feelings, when i'm out of most of the business crusade seems like the disruption is quite dire there as they're explaining it. what do you see as the short term solution or trajectory that the government should be headed in is really

no other solution except for this solution that we've been mentioning yet. saying that to air the coal fired power plants consist of 80 percent of our total is supplying south africa. and without concentrating on that and having only 50 percent of those pop, lance generating electricity you, i'm not going to come up with that problem because it's gonna take you years. infrastructure is long times. it's gonna take you years to bring in new infrastructure. so all the solutions we're talking about from regional buying power . now utilities, that's just not sufficient doing procurement programs. that's good, that's good, but that's whoops. still not gonna solve the problem. the primary problem that you need to solve is to seek a fixed deal with cub court fat powerfully and make sure that it's operating at optimality. at least they a board of s. com. understand that because they have that,

that is one of the upper energies and they've given us timelines in terms of which they wish to turn that around. that i think that the others would wishing that to at least the ed president can fund today. is that national treasury will help as calm in terms of the debt that b o and by reducing it. so that solution is coming and we hope it comes sooner rather than later. those are the interventions that you need to, to support as calmly so that they can break hill from what each now equipment, manufacturers that can help them address this problem. i'm, you know, i'm curious. jacob, you seem like you were nodding as we were hearing from a who say there, what do you make of the president's performance recently in terms of how he's trying to quell the concerns of the public? ah, not necessarily asking you to comment in the state of a commentator but, but i have to say a lot of the people that we've been hearing from, for example, i'll share with you one video comment that was sent to this show from c bond yecynnia delhi lozzo kind of really highlighting just what this devastating loss

means for people to take a listen. this is tim, may i please have and we've been met, continues to services. i provided care to their patients because they located the stuff in to get this in to do that because now the to the label, this is a challenge and be able to get to the prompting healthcare facilities. i mean, that's a serious concern, is, is the president,

do you think a giving the public, the sense that he takes this as seriously as their lives are being affected? look, i think, i think he takes it seriously. well, well, what criticism is the solution? see please scratch. i think that little people that are giving him videos, which i believe are removing the focus on the release. in some cases, you say that interest, business interests, especially around the u. s. become too dominant in taking over the crisis to pause . you know, do you have a f, a, a pace in any grid for the purposes of reducing emissions, but they don't bring stability of supply that is required by speak seeing what is broken. and i think, i think, you know, i mean this is be now a problem, but in the particular west and every time you go to state nation,

it we have, it's actually a west problem. so i left it, we'll see it turned out real. turn around. yeah. in less space of locating welding the steps. i'm glad that you brought up renewables in that question. in our youtube chad. bob saw saying, why aren't south africans benefiting from solar energy? a lot of people bringing up renewable energy as well. for example, we had a video comment sent to us from re beto mckoko, a chef there in south africa, who well take a listen to what she said. so we try to get more get the highest by mere limited due to finances. we can afford solar energy, we kind of were generated. so guess is our next phase thing. so we try to catch like a guess oven that we use when this low shooting. we try and beat them to schedule. so we try and talk and blend and boil things out with the k 12 before the shooting

goes also, it's just a matter. we actually just always working in a panic mode. those are some of the things and not stocking as much. so we buy limited dr. wade and limit food. what is because the losses that will in terry will be having to my so working in a panic mode does not seem like a recipe for success for any economy or a business or individual. you know, with that in mind poking me there, i'm wondering if it seems obvious that the whole world south africa included, needs to move away from fossil fuels. but what does that transition look like? i mean, how can it be adjust transition in your mind? well, we have to close the state that whatsoever cause doing in what the south african government is implementing is not a just transition even though the president used that term multiple times in his sona to day. he was perverting the term because as the working class and the poor of this country, we are experiencing extreme hardship. as

a result of the really senseless decision to rush to move off the dependence of a coal fired power stations and a rush to implement renewable energy. we prescribe to the just transition principles as defined by the international labor organization was actually result which talk about how this transition must actually address the socio economic problems of south africa. so in other words, if your transition is going to result in more joblessness, more inequality, higher prices of energy, it's not just transition. and that's what's happening in south africa. you've got the renewable energy sector, which is entirely controlled by the private sector. eskimo has no role to play in rolling out renewable energy, and he didn't even talk about milan away. the closure of these qualified past stations is going to result in a 100000 jobs last, right? so that all of that violates what is dest transition is. what we're seeing in south

africa is just green capitalism running rampant. yeah, and it's really, and it's going to have a destructive effect on the poor in the and perhaps it already has a lot of people on our youtube chart saying, you know, you need to remove the state monopoly and ask scientists and engineers to step in and direct the projects we also have jacobs, the bang saying the whole load shredding thing is affecting his business in such a way. his sales have dropped and he's thinking of closing shop. and last but not least, tar and con, saying south africa has solar and wind power and abundance, but we can't change because of the state monopoly. so a lot of people are echoing some of the concerns that you shared with us today. i want to thank you, jacob, and all of our jazz for being with us today. puck mulay, of course, and who say, we will see you next time. and this is a conversation that we will be following here at the stream. you can follow us adstream dot al jazeera dot com ah,

a tooth ah, with us we can still use from african perspectives on the marine by the just a business when the short documentary from african feel. i'm going to do this from south africa, ethiopia. and nigeria,

we've been robust from stuff in this class. she saw this as my and my role on africa direct on al jazeera, on counting the called the green. somebody rice accelerate. can europe compete with the u. s. and china president loosens the past ratings and demands low interest rates in brazil. but when it was last, hong kong faces the highest rates of homelessness in a decade, counting the cost on al jazeera ah, ah,

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