President Cyril Ramaphosa acknowledged the “devastating impact” of almost daily loadshedding on the economy and the lives of South Africans but insisted in a speech made in response to the debate on his State of the Nation Address (SoNA) that South Africa would emerge from the electricity crisis with a “completely transformed energy landscape”. Following the embarrassment of his SoNA statement that “the end of loadshedding is finally within reach”, which was promptly undermined by the implementation of Stage 6 only days later, several opposition parties lambasted the President for being out of touch.