Ezekiel Nyoni

The UN’s Agenda 2030’s goal number 7 is that clean and affordable energy should be accessible to all. All sub-Sahara African countries agreed to this however the argument with politicians has always been the right to the electricity itself. Current legislation in most countries acknowledges that their respective citizens have the right to access electric energy however they do not have absolute rights to electricity. This is mainly because most African countries do not even have the resources and infrastructure to provide electricity to their entire population. This has created an unlevel ground on the practicality of the equal right to access clean energy as governments start to allocate access to energy, with the poor being at the lower end of the ladder. In addition to this problem corruption within state-owned electric companies coupled with the illegal electric connections by citizens themselves has made it difficult for governments to really plan for expansion of electrification programs.

The current electricity generation in Africa has been outpaced by the rising rate of population growth. The latest statistics on the electricity access published by the World Bank show that as of 2016 only 42.8% of the continent have access to electricity. However for the question posed of quality and reliable electricity that becomes a different case altogether. One of Africa’s biggest economy South Africa which has one of the highest access to electricity figures at 84.6% has been experiencing nationwide load-shedding. This is one of the good examples where access to electric energy is guaranteed however, the reliability of the provision of the energy is not guaranteed. Now you have industries being classified into zones where now the electrical energy is now being provided on condition of the industry’s importance to the country’s economy. In most cases, it is those in a position of power who determine the important criteria.

There should be a revisit on Legislative vehicles that hold the politicians and government officials to account in regard to fair and equal access to electricity for all Africans. Legislation in Africa makes it easy for governments not to be accountable to give outright constitutional rights to electricity as in the case of water. Indirectly the exclusion to the access of a reliable electric grid are the costs of connection coupled with high electricity tariffs. It is not a secret that Africa is the youngest and poorest continent in the world. Now if the costs are too high the poor which are the majority are circumstantially excluded from connecting to the grid hence the access to electricity becomes a privilege for the rich ones. Some examples where the poor citizens need a protective legislation policy is for those that stay in informal settlements or in areas where they use a communal address like in rural villages. In most African countries the state-owned electric companies use the failure to produce a stand-alone physical residential address as the reason for not being able to provide a connection to the grid. 

After connections are done, limited infrastructure maintenance and security support are provided, this leads to frequent faults in the long run plus cable and transformer oil theft. Respective electrical companies attend to these challenges depending on the location the rich get a faster response and the poor can go for days if not weeks before their problem is resolved.  

Henceforth access to quality reliable electricity is a right for all citizens on paper only and in practice, it is a privilege for only 42.8% of the continent of which vast majority of the 42.8% are also excluded through load sheddings and other socio-economic challenges and factors.