A little over a year ago, Zero Carbon Charge was a bold experiment: a South African startup born from a mission to solve the country’s twin crises of chronic power cuts and a transport sector addicted to fossil fuels. Its vision was to build a nationwide network of off-grid, solar-powered charging stations, making electric vehicles a viable reality in a nation famous for vast distances and an unreliable grid.
Today, with its first station operational and a fresh R100 million (~$5.6m) investment from the state’s own Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA), that vision is taking shape. It’s a remarkable story of homegrown cleantech innovation in a market lagging its global peers. But if you ask the company’s founder, Joubert Roux, a wall of bureaucracy is about to bring the entire project to a screeching halt.
In a letter addressed to South Africa’s new Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition, Parks Tau, Roux has delivered a blistering-yet-measured broadside — the kind of polite corporate fury that signals a breaking point. His target? A government tax policy that punishes electric vehicles with duties of up to 55%, while giving their polluting petrol and diesel counterparts a pass.
“South Africa’s current EV import duties… are actively stalling market growth,” Roux stated plainly. It’s a policy, he argues, that unravels years of climate commitments before they’ve even begun.
A Tax on the Future
At the heart of the crisis is South Africa’s tariff structure. Currently, an imported EV is hit with a 25% import duty, plus an ad valorem tax that can climb as high as 30%. In stark contrast, an internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle faces a duty of just 18%.
This means in a country desperately trying to meet climate goals, the government’s policy makes it significantly more expensive to import the solution than it does to import the problem. For a potential EV buyer, the message from the taxman is clear: stick to petrol.
Roux argues that this isn’t just misguided; it’s an active deterrent. It makes the cheapest EVs unaffordable for the mass market, strangling demand and ensuring the EV ecosystem remains a niche for the wealthy.
The Silent Giants and a State Divided
The government isn’t the only target of CHARGE’s frustration. The country’s incumbent Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), who have built their empires on the internal combustion engine, have remained conspicuously silent on the issue.
As Roux notes, these entrenched players are “resisting the inevitable shift and blocking practical measures to stimulate EV adoption.” The tariff, whether by design or by default, serves to protect the legacy auto industry from the disruptive threat of electrification.
The situation descends into near-farce when you consider the government’s left hand doesn’t seem to know what its right hand is funding. While the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC) maintains these EV-hostile tariffs, another state-owned entity, the DBSA, has just injected millions into Zero Carbon Charge. This is the ultimate policy contradiction: one part of the state is building the house while another is taxing the bricks needed to build it.
A Ticking Clock from Brussels and Pretoria
The timing of this confrontation is critical. South Africa’s auto industry, a cornerstone of its manufacturing base, faces an existential threat from Europe’s looming 2035 ban on new ICE vehicle sales — a primary export market. Without a domestic EV industry, there will soon be nothing to export.
Simultaneously, the government must contend with its own Climate Change Act. Signed into law this year, it brings the threat of fines up to R10 million and jail time for failing to meet emissions targets. The current tax policy puts the country on a direct collision course with its own laws.
“We cannot say we want to accelerate EV adoption while looking in the rear-view mirror,” Roux commented, pointing out that countries like Morocco and Kenya are already pulling ahead with more welcoming regulations.
Like TymeBank’s plea to the Department of Home Affairs, Zero Carbon Charge insists this is not a war it wants. The letter is a call for urgent reform before it’s too late. The solution is simple: cut the tariffs, level the playing field, and let the market grow. This, Roux argues, will create the “flywheel” of demand needed to justify local manufacturing of EVs and batteries.
Still, the tone suggests a growing impatience. It’s no longer just a technical debate over tariff codes. It has become a symbolic moment for South Africa’s industrial and environmental future. For the country’s growing cleantech ecosystem, it is also a test. Can you build a successful, state-backed green-tech solution, only to be kneecapped by another government department’s legacy-era policy?
So What Now?
Zero Carbon Charge and its investors have proved that off-grid EV infrastructure is not a pipe dream in Africa. But as Roux’s letter makes clear, innovation without systemic support may not be enough. The mood is shifting from the optimism of securing funding to the frustration of hitting a policy brick wall.
It’s not quite an open revolt against the new minister. But it’s a clear and public demand for change, laid out for all to see. It’s a signal that for South Africa’s green transition, the real roadblock isn’t technology or capital — it’s the tariff schedule.