Editing Thabo Mbeki (section)

=== Electricity crisis ===
{{see also|South African energy crisis}}

In late 2007, Mbeki's government announced that the public power utility, [[Eskom]], would introduce electricity rationing or rolling blackouts, commonly known in South Africa as [[Rolling blackout|loadshedding]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Grootes|first=Stephen|date=2019-12-08|title=Twelve years of load shedding – written, starring & directed by the ANC|url=https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-12-09-twelve-years-of-load-shedding-written-starring-directed-by-the-anc/|access-date=2022-02-04|website=Daily Maverick|language=en}}</ref> In subsequent months, Mbeki publicly apologised, acknowledging that the government had failed to heed Eskom's warnings, offered regularly for several consecutive years, that infrastructure investments were required to avoid energy shortages – in his words, "Eskom was right and government was wrong."<ref>{{cite web|last=Sokopo|first=Asa|date=2007-12-12|title=Mbeki apologises for SA power cuts|url=https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/mbeki-apologises-for-sa-power-cuts-382421|access-date=2022-02-04|website=IOL|language=en}}</ref> However, some analysts suggested that insufficient investment was not the hindrance to electricity supply, and that other policy decisions by government and at Eskom, including the implementation of black economic empowerment criteria in coal procurement contracts, had contributed to the crisis.<ref>{{cite web|last=Newmarch|first=Jocelyn|date=2008-02-11|title=Anatomy of a catastrophe|url=http://www.mg.co.za/articlepage.aspx?area=%2Finsight%2Finsight__economy__business&articleid=331969|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080213174054/http://www.mg.co.za/articlepage.aspx?area=/insight/insight__economy__business&articleid=331969|archive-date=2008-02-13|access-date=2022-02-04|website=Mail & Guardian}}</ref> In his last [[State of the Nation Address (South Africa)|State of the Nation]] address in February 2008, Mbeki repeated the apology and devoted nearly three pages of his speech to government's plans for addressing the energy crisis.<ref>{{cite web|last=Boyle|first=Brendan|date=2008-02-08|title=It's business unusual - Mbeki|url=http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=701786|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081223022637/http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=701786|archive-date=2008-12-23|access-date=2022-02-04|website=Sunday Times}}</ref>