Women are disproportionately affected by climate impacts and economic exclusion. Photo: David Harrison/M&G
For rural communities in South Africa, climate change is not an abstract concept but a daily reality. This was made clear by Her Majesty Queen Neo Mopeli, a newly appointed commissioner of the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC), at a recent event it hosted.
“The just transition is about people,” Mopeli said, speaking from the perspective of rural and traditional communities.
She said South Africa’s shift toward a low-carbon, climate-resilient economy must not reproduce past inequalities but instead build a more inclusive and equitable future.
Across the country, economic shifts, particularly in the energy system, had left local industries without adequate support, information or agency, she said. Women were disproportionately affected by climate impacts and economic exclusion and young people continued to face alarmingly high unemployment.
“For many of our communities, particularly those in rural and traditional communities, climate change is not a distant or abstract concept. It is a lived experience daily through persistent water scarcity, declining agricultural productivity, food insecurity, loss of livelihoods and income opportunities that are simply not there.”
The queen was one of several new commissioners speaking at the PCC’s media breakfast, held before the commissioner’s strategic session for 2026 to 2030 and the 21st quarterly commission.
The session brought together the full cohort of newly appointed commissioners under the Climate Change Act. The discussions made one thing unmistakably clear: South Africa’s just transition is entering a more accountable and action-oriented phase and the pressure to deliver is no longer abstract.
The panel was led by PCC deputy chair Dipak Patel, who drew on insights from the PCC’s five-year legacy and review report to frame the conversation. Patel outlined the objectives of the 2026 to 2030 strategic plan, clarified the commission’s advisory mandate under the Climate Change Act and reflected on the country’s just transition agenda.
He said the commissioners, who were drawn from diverse sectors, brought quantitative, scientific and socioeconomic perspectives to the PCC: a breadth of expertise essential for navigating the complexity of the transition ahead.
Reflecting on the leadership of previous deputy chairs Valli Moosa and Dr Crispin Oliver, Patel said South Africa’s Just Transition Framework, adopted by the cabinet, remained a beacon for ensuring no one was left behind.
“The justices mentioned in the Just Transition Framework deal with restorative, procedural and distributional justice and those remain key tenets of any choices we make with respect to how to pursue that transition,” he said.
Yet, translating that framework into reality has not been without friction. Over the years, South Africa’s just transition plan has faced criticism from climate activists and communities near coal-fired plants, as well as other marginalised groups, who have described progress as little more than a “ticking time bomb”.
Against this backdrop, the new commissioners arrive with both a mandate and a sense of urgency to act.
New PCC commissioner and Sanedi chief executive Dr Zwanani Titus Mathe highlighted structural obstacles that stood between the just transition framework and its implementation.
“Let us focus on the implementation of the framework, then we will self-correct,” he said.
Mathe said the PCC’s consensus mechanism should empower stakeholders and increase awareness.
He identified two main causes of fragmentation: unclear, uncoordinated social and economic policies and overlapping roles among actors in the field.
Addressing those issues, he said, required integrating climate change into national and sectoral planning, mobilising investments for climate resilience and leveraging the tools of the Just Transition Framework.
Mathe called for a national climate research agenda and for translating research into accessible formats that policymakers and stakeholders could use.
Boitumelo Molete, a PCC member and the social development policy coordinator at Cosatu, brought a pragmatic, urgent perspective. She said the labour movement’s responsibility was clear: to ensure that workers remained at the heart of transition planning.
“The key aspect of the just transition for us as organised labour includes ensuring that this is a worker-focused initiative that those who are in coal-dependent regions and workers who are at the centre of the transition are not left destitute or abandoned during the shift to renewable energy,” Molete said.
She cited the decommissioning of Komati Power Station as an example and a warning. Poor management of the shutdown had left workers and the community without meaningful economic alternatives or adequate support, a failure that she said must not be repeated.
“As the new commission and as articulated by organised labour, our role is to return to Komati and ensure that the work at Komati and the community there are genuinely considered in issues of economic diversification,” Molete said.
She called for reskilling and upskilling programmes and robust social protection measures to safeguard workers in mining, energy and related sectors. Communities in Mpumalanga, Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal, heavily reliant on coal, must receive targeted guidance and support as the transition deepened.
Looking ahead, the PCC’s priorities for 2026 to 2030 are clear: to strengthen community-led engagement and outreach, drive climate-integrated national and sectoral planning and ensure that the Just Transition Framework moves from policy language into tangible economic and social outcomes.