Abstract
South Africa has formulated many anti- poverty energy policies and programmes to
eliminate energy poverty for marginalized communities in rural and peri-urban areas.
Each municipality must provide Free Basic Electricity to poor households as part of the
broader anti-poverty strategy and social agenda. The policy is provided to help
households have affordable access to basic electricity, which is deemed enough for
cooking, ironing clothes, and lighting. Notwithstanding this provision, the government still
experiences challenges in implementing the policy.
The study's thrust was to investigate the challenges experienced in the Free Basic
Electricity Policy implementation in three peri-urban communities of Motinti, Leokama,
and Mashashe in Polokwane's Moletji area. Qualitative research method was applied to
the study to investigate the main research question and sub-questions. Semi-structured
interview schedule was used to collect qualitative data from the respondents. The study
used a sample of fifty-seven respondents from the selected three groups, comprising
community members, Eskom, and Polokwane Local Municipality officials. The researcher
employed a purposive non-probability sampling method.
Findings for Eskom and Polokwane Local Municipality mainly point to the ineffectiveness
of the government to provide basic services because of inherited apartheid legacy, which
is worsened by challenges such as lack of investment in infrastructure, lack of financial
investment, and managerial failures at both Eskom and the municipality, which all lead to
mismanagement/misappropriation of funds. Moreover, community members felt that
government was not doing enough even though the government provided basic services.
Community members expressed a lack of communication, lack of accountability and lack
of transparency as contributing to the failures of FBE policy implementation in the
municipality. The study concluded that there is a lack of Free Basic Electricity Policy
implementation capacity in the municipality, and the municipality must address these
challenges to ensure that the policy is implemented in deserving communities.