Opposition party Democratic Alliance (DA) leader John Steenhuisen on Friday reiterated his party’s move to have Eskom’s decision to increase electricity prices by 31.4% declared invalid as South Africans have been left in the cold by what he calls an "uncaring" government.

In his weekly newsletter Steenhuisen said Eskom’s failures are owing to government’s failure to take responsibility and defend constitutional rights.

The country is back to stage 6 loadshedding, despite Minister of Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa’s promise that South Africa will not go back to stage 5 and 6.

The DA leader said R233-billion of taxpayer money has been spent on 15 years of construction at the Kusile power station, yet it is not generating a single kilowatt of electricity.

He says the African National Congress’ (ANC’s) failure to provide energy supply is a violation of most of the provisions in the Bill of Rights.

“The DA, by contrast, cares deeply and is taking every possible action to fight loadshedding and uphold people’s rights. In my newsletter last week, I set out how the DA is tackling the root cause of loadshedding: cadre deployment. This week, the DA went to court to fight the Nersa tariff hike, and to have overall control of electricity supply taken out of the ANC’s hands and put into the hands of an independent energy expert who will report directly to the Court,“ said Steenhuisen.

He pointed out that in the DA-governed Cape Town, R1.2-billion is being invested in the maintenance and expansion of the Steenbras Hydro Pumped Storage Scheme, to protect Cape Town residents from two stages of loadshedding.

Steenhuisen promises South Africans that his party can replace the ANC government next year with a caring, capable government alongside six other parties in the Multi-Party Charter.

“This is the fight of our lives, and we’re not pulling any punches,“ he said.