Eskom

2022 - 12 - 19

Post cover — Image courtesy of "BizNews"

It's absurd to blame De Ruyter for Eskom's failure - BizNews.com (BizNews)

Andrew Kenny argues that what ruined Eskom was the failure to build power stations in the 1990s, destructive racial policies such as affirmative action, ...

Unfortunately, De Ruyter was allowed to do few of the things necessary to fix Eskom. This means scrapping BEE coal procurement, which is probably the single biggest cause of Eskom’s debt, and which has caused great damage to Eskom’s power stations and to the environment of Mpumalanga. The first thing is to fix the existing Eskom fleet. If diesel costs less than that – and it does cost far less than that – we should buy all the diesel we need. The resignation of André de Ruyter is sad and disturbing. It had nothing to do with Mantashe’s mad claim that Eskom (ie De Ruyter) was ‘actively agitating to overthrow the state.’ Simply put: De Ruyter was not allowed to touch many of these issues, and so was unable to fix Eskom. The Energy Availability Factor, which gives the percentage of power units available for generation, went down and down. Here is what has ruined Eskom: failure to build power stations in the 1990s, destructive racial policies such as affirmative action, BEE, cadre deployment, employment equity and transformation, awful planning, bad choice of power station design, over-manning, shoddy workmanship and gross incompetence, and finally massive corruption, eventually resulting in outright crime and sabotage. The scary thing about it is that its beliefs and policies are no different from many in the ANC, the SACP, the unions and the RET. The EFF described De Ruyter and Pravin Gordhan, the Public Enterprises Minister, as part of ‘the Indian and white supremacists who are crippling our national assets’. In an official statement, dated 14 December 2022, entitled ‘De Ruyter’s resignation long overdue’, the EFF declared that the ‘Eskom CEO is incompetent, arrogant and useless and he was never qualified to be appointed to position.’ Andrew Kenny argues that what ruined Eskom was the failure to build power stations in the 1990s, destructive racial policies such as affirmative action, BEE, cadre deployment, employment equity and transformation, awful planning, bad choice of power station design, over-manning, shoddy workmanship and gross incompetence; and finally massive corruption, eventually resulting in outright crime and sabotage.

André de Ruyter under investigation for 'irregularity' at Eskom (Citizen)

Eskom was left in state of disarray last week following the resignation of André de Ruyter as the country battles relentless load shedding.

[André de Ruyter: Set up to fail from the start](https://www.citizen.co.za/news/opinion/andre-de-ruyter-set-up-fail-19-december-2022/) [Growing threat at Eskom risks energy infrastructure – Presidency](https://www.citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/growing-threat-eskom-risks-energy-infrastructure-presidency/) [“recent media reports”](https://www.citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/load-shedding/eskom-agitates-overthrow-state-not-dealing-load-shedding-mantashe/) as among the reasons for him not to be able to continue his tenure. [Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe](https://www.citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/politics/mantashe-destructive-politician-zuma-magashule-habib-december-2022/) publicly accused Eskom’s management of “agitating for the overthrow of the state”. [Sunday Times](https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2022-12-18-de-ruyter-probed-for-irregularity-at-eskom/), while there was no evidence to suggest De Ruyter benefited from the alleged breach of regulations, he is the second executive at Megawatt Park to resign since the start of an investigation by the new board’s audit and risk subcommittee, chaired by chartered accountant Fathima Gany. [Eskom](https://twitter.com/Eskom_SA) was left in state of disarray last week, following the resignation of [De Ruyter](https://www.citizen.co.za/tag/andre-de-ruyter/).

Eskom needs a new management team - but so does South Africa (TechCentral)

For a multitude of reasons, Eskom CEO André de Ruyter's resignation is a huge setback for the state-owned power utility and South Africa.

Now it’s up to the board to find courageous and energetic replacements who can regain the country’s confidence in the ability of this government to run a state-owned utility. Simultaneous to restoring the coal fleet, the new CEO must focus on the renewable energy programme, which, at this point, is being hindered by limitations in transmission. Both stations are critical to the longer-term stability of the grid, at least until 2050. The new CEO will have to ensure that the “special law enforcement team to help Eskom in confronting crime and corruption”, about which President Cyril Ramaphosa [previously](https://theconversation.com/what-it-will-take-for-south-africas-ailing-power-utility-to-keep-going-183777) that rolling blackouts were driving large-scale customers away from the national grid into cheaper and more reliable options. Of the 18GW customer base subject to power cuts, at least one half will find alternative energy supplies, either directly or through private utility companies. [purposeful malfunction and sabotage](http://apanews.net/en/pays/afrique-du-sud/news/sabotage-rampant-at-safricas-eskom-power-stations-official) to earn higher maintenance and other fees from the utility. Similarly, the utility’s carbon emissions are about [200 million tonnes per year](https://www.news24.com/fin24/opinion/opinion-eskom-has-been-called-the-worlds-worst-polluting-power-company-just-how-bad-is-it-20211105#:%7E:text=According%20to%20Eskom's%20most%20recent,from%20all%20its%20power%20stations.), representing 40% of South Africa’s total emissions. This means that large users will not be returning to the grid any time soon. Since only 66% of Eskom’s demand side is subject to power cuts — the national key points which consume 33% of the total demand are untouched by load shedding — this means six to eight hours per day of no power for the average consumer. This is instead of 5.2GW [promised](https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2022-07-26-here-it-is-ramaphosas-energy-action-plan-to-end-sas-rolling-blackouts/) by President Cyril Ramaphosa in his Electricity Action Plan delivered in July 2022. Stability is critical for success in the three key transitions Eskom needs to navigate.

Black Engineers' Society Slams Pravin Gordhan for Defending De ... (Briefly)

The president of the National Society of Black Engineers slammed Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan for defending outgoing Eskom CEO André de ...

He has his team that deliberately collapses State SOEs." Mlaba rubbished Gordhan's defence of saying that it was bizarre. "I don't know what's wrong with our people. The NSBE president claimed that De Ruyter's was out of his depth and did not have the technical know-how to lead the power utility out of loadshedding. Last week, Public Enterprises Minister Gordhan came to the defence of De Ruyter claiming that the Eskom CEO did his best to try get the power utility out of the mess it is in, [Eskom](https://briefly.co.za/tag/eskom/) engineer added that the power utility has deteriorated severely with De Ruyter as CEO with 2022 being the worst year in the power utility history.

Gayton McKenzie shares 7 steps to fix blackouts (The South African)

Leader of the Patriotic Alliance Gayton McKenzie wants to be Eskom CEO and has SEVEN steps to resolve loadshedding for good.

Each and every person who will sit on the board should not only be capable but should serve a targeted purpose in solving our energy crisis, we cannot just have people on the board that obtained degrees in their respective fields, we need the smartest people on the Eskom Board, we have many smart people in SA and abroad. Eskom should not only have a hotline to report corruption but we should have a huge financial reward system for anyone coming forward with information regarding criminal conduct past and present at Eskom. As human beings who have long had to work out how to survive on a hostile planet, remaining poor and underdeveloped has never been an answer to any of the problems we face. We need to not only make ourselves independent and wealthy through energy, but share this bounty with the rest of the continent. The sooner we can end poverty everywhere, the sooner we can reach a point where everyone is in a position to live on this planet sustainably. South Africa produces just a little more than 1% of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions. It’s a suppressed fact because certain interests need to push the agenda that poverty and inequality today are worse than ever. What countries in the developed world are forcing down our throats though, is an unacceptable form of energy imperialism. We have been hyperfocused for too long on Eskom being the problem in South Africa, when Eskom is not our problem. Our problem is that we don’t have enough electricity in South Africa. The failings at Eskom are seen as the primary reason for why we don’t have enough electricity, when really Eskom is just a part of the problem. There will be industries, and with industries will come jobs.

White-owned companies captured Eskom: Former employee (Independent Online)

He said he established this after the utility refused to accredit him to provide courses and training for operating regulations for high voltage systems ...

Maaba, who has been in this field for more than 20 years, said he requested to see the assessment sheet and Hapeldt refused. He said he took the matter to former Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter and an investigation was instituted at Megawatt Park Procurement. Rajkumar told me to go fly, saying they had enough training providers and they didn't need more." He said only white-owned companies were accredited to provide training for ORHVS. I was then told I had to answer oral questions on ORHVS, and I did. “This happened when I requested to be accredited as a service provider for ORHVS and related courses in 2017.