Minister Ramokgopa temporarily withdrew plans to procure new nuclear power on Friday, following a legal challenge by the Southern African Faith Communities' Environment Institute and Earthlife Africa Johannesburg.

In a shock move on Friday, the Minister of Energy and Electricity, Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, announced that he would be withdrawing the gazette to procure new nuclear power capacity - for now. He added that despite this decision, "nuclear is the future" and that it would be back on the table at a later stage.

He said this was in response to the "substantive" legal challenges posed by the Southern African Faith Communities' Environment Institute and Earthlife Africa Johannesburg.

Daily Maverick previously reported that at the end of 2023, the minister announced that all the "suspensive conditions" to start procuring 2,500MW of new nuclear power immediately had been met.

Ramokgopa explained at the time that "Department of Mineral Resources and Energy submitted the report to the regulator addressing these suspensive conditions in July of 2023. Of course, Nersa (National Energy Regulator of South Africa) still had an obligation to satisfy itself if the response from the department to the suspensive conditions are sufficient for Nersa to consider giving this process the green light. And I am happy to indicate that on 30 August 2023, Nersa considered the department's...