Gordhan expects electricity law before election

Pravin Gordhan, South Africa’s public enterprises minister, said he expects changes to the country’s Electricity Regulation Act to be passed before an election expected in about May next year.

The changes are needed to allow the division of the state power utility into separate generation, transmission and distribution units, he said in a speech on Thursday in Worcester in the Western Cape at the opening of battery power storage plant. They will also loosen state control on generation and trading of electricity in the country.

“That will take another couple of months to get through parliament, but before the elections next year,” he said. Still, he said, “it will take us another five years or more to settle the system.”