The announcement by President Cyril Ramaphosa on emergency action on energy contained a laundry list of actions, but the most important was the maintenance of coal-fired plants - a welcome move for South Africa giving it more bang for its bucks.
This will allow South Africa the space to be back in the promise of what he announced in January 2017 at the World Economic Forum, in Davos, which was that load shedding in South Africa was history.
But this comes on the back of the financial and economic fight over use of fossil fuel versus renewables, a battle that is far from over.
Ramaphosa - taking a U-turn on his promise to the European Union and the US on the Just Transition with promises of clean energy - will not be an act of weakness, but one of waking up to the historical hypocrisy of prevaricating. This in the face of the brute force of colonial masters when it comes to matters of their self-interest.
Here is one of those moments of self-interest that came out last week.
In the Wall Street Journal on August 24, Richard Vanderford penned a piece, saying that Texas, in the US, had blacklisted BlackRock, BNP Paribas, UBS and other institutions for allegedly boycotting the fossil-fuel industry, the energy base of that state.
Every day since the Russian-Ukraine war started, the tone on renewables has dwindled and an ignition towards fossil fuel has been sparked, not only by those who published regulations for that to happen, but shown by the surprising move by Texas to punish those who have stopped providing finance for burning the planet.
The stand taken by the state of Texas comes in the aftermath of Europe, the US and Japan restarting their nuclear and coal plants.
In fact, the energy industry in these countries has unwittingly declared nuclear as a way to go as they fight for energy self-sufficiency. These are countries that a few months back were wooing South Africa to abandon coal for renewables and dangling an initial $8.5 billion (R143bn) in its face.
For South Africa, the coal business has made a remarkable comeback. South Africa's Thungela Resources earlier this month reported half-year profit more than 20 times that of the year before, buoyed by soaring coal prices, and said it would return R8.2bn to shareholders.
The reality is the world is returning to coal as the supply is secure.
So what is this hypocrisy by South Africa for as long as the coal is not burnt in my village, elsewhere is fine.
Yet a few days ago Andre De Ruyter, the CEO of Eskom, was seen signing an agreement with the Cape Peninsula University of Technology as he commits to closing and repurposing the Komati coal-fired station and opening the empty purse of Eskom to the tune of R 8.5bn in this wild goose chase of renewable energy that Europe and the US have given a break to for now.
The question has to be asked as to what priorities does South Africa have, how committed we are to those and what in our view constitutes our national interest? Or are we seeing the pursuit of the Mahoney Agenda and the Governor of New York to kill it and kill it quickly?
Unfortunately, the overwhelming evidence on energy security and the response of Germany, in particular, tells us that this agenda of moving away from coal quickly will not pass.
As the metric tonnes of coal we export to the West fires European and Asian industry continue to flow at an accelerated pace, but not the coal-fired power stations of South Africa for its industrialisation benefit, what is clear is that coal as a source of energy is here to stay.
For Germany, and the rest of Europe, and the US, are determined not to ever depend on Russia, or anyone for that matter, for energy ever again.
With Texas and the rest of the world behaving the way they do as regards fossil fuel, nuclear and not renewables as clean energy is poised for massive financing.
The question is who is foolish here in this matrix of capital?
Dr Pali Lehohla is the director of the Economic Modelling Academy, a Professor of Practice at the University of Johannesburg, a Research Associate at Oxford University, a board member of Institute for Economic Justice at Wits and a distinguished Alumni of the University of Ghana. He is the former Statistician-General of South Africa.
BUSINESS REPORT ONLINE