After last year‘s massive protests against the already high costs of living, that left more then a thousand people jailed and more then a hundred dead, massive protests errupted yet again. On Monday thousands of people took to the streets, protested, blocked roads, confronted the police and set ablaze government buildings.
According to data provided by the South African Governement itself, many essential goods (such as Bread and Oil) as well as essential services – such as public transport – have seen staggering increases in prices in comparision to last year:
- "Bread and cereal products recorded an annual rate of 11,2% in June
- Meat prices increased by 9,5% in the 12 months to June [...] with polony recording the highest annual increase (19,0%).
- The index for oils and fats registered an annual increase of 32,5
- Transport goods and services recorded an average annual price increase of 20,0% and a monthly rise of 4,2%. Fuel prices were up by 45,3% in June"
Not only is there a spike in the increase of prices of goods and services, partially due to the inflation, but the situation is further aggrevated as the Government and the state administered electricy company Eskom increase the prices for electricity while on the otherhand haveing frequent outages as they attept to increase profits to satisfy debts to the international money markets totalling 25 Billion USD.
In the face of this servere worsening of living conditions, illusions in the current socalled “transitionary government” further collapsed and people went out in force to rebell against the forced blackouts and their increasing poverty. Thousands protested the current conditions on August 1 by setting up roadblocks, confronting the police as well as targeting government and Eskom property. Serveral Eskom vehilces were torched and government buildings set ablaze. In a vain attempt to repress this struggle, police shot dead serveral protesters during the course of the day. As the situation has not yet cooled down and no improvement of the situation is in sight (and the “transitionary government” today announced its plans to stay in power for two more years) more combative protests are bound to take place.
