Gordhan and Mufamadi to brief MPs on corruption at Eskom after De Ruyter refuses to name names

Mkhuleko Hlengwa, IFP member and Scopa chairperson during the appearance of former Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter before Parliamentary Committee on 26 April, 2023 in Cape Town, South Africa. (Photo by Gallo Images/Brenton Geach/Gallo Images)

By Marianne Merten

26 Apr 2023

Next time former Eskom boss André de Ruyter appears before MPs it will probably be in terms of a summons aimed at obtaining names and details. But first, Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan and presidential security adviser Sydney Mufamadi get to tell what, if anything, they did when informed of organised crime and corruption at Eskom.

Parliament’s public spending watchdog, the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa), is walking a tightrope in getting to the bottom of the Eskom corruption quagmire — it must hold politicking manoeuvres at bay while pushing for facts and accountability — not in soundbites but in Parliament.

That fundamental questions of governance, accountability and institutional meddling exist emerged in Wednesday’s appearance of former Eskom CEO André de Ruyter before MPs.

Read more in Daily Maverick: Tight-lipped De Ruyter rejects ANC claims of Eskom corruption inaction — points to Gordhan, Mufamadi for answers

Calling him was the first step towards a parliamentary inquiry Scopa raised after De Ruyter’s e.tv television interview in late February on the involvement of cartels and “high-ranking politicians” in corruption at Eskom. It triggered sharp pushback from the ANC — both from Luthuli House and the government.

The interview led to De Ruyter leaving Eskom five weeks before his scheduled departure at the end of March.

But corruption claims at the troubled Eskom are not going away, given persistent rolling power cuts that leave South Africans without electricity for up to 10 hours a day. These scheduled blackouts are set to be a hot issue in the run-up to the 2024 elections.

For the ANC, a Scopa parliamentary inquiry would be a pickle. In mid-March, the governing party used its numerical dominance to vote against a proposed ad hoc committee to probe the organised crime claims. A week later, ANC numbers in the House nixed a parliamentary inquiry into the Phala Phala presidential farm forex debacle.

On Wednesday, the two ANC MPs on Scopa, Bheki Hadebe and Sakhumzi Somyo, suggested that the so-called intelligence report, a privately funded initiative that pinpointed the cartels and organised crime operations at Eskom, should be referred to Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence. That’s where all matters even tenuously hitched to intelligence go to die as everything there is deemed secret, to be dealt with only behind closed doors.

Former Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter on screen chatting with political party members at his appearance before the Parliamentary Committee on 26 April, 2023 in Cape Town, South Africa. He appeared virtually before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) to give more details about the corruption and maladministration claims he made in a televised interview. (Photo: Gallo Images/Brenton Geach/Gallo Images)

A game plan emerges

All, from the EFF to the DA and IFP, rejected this proposal, but a game plan emerged. On Wednesday, 3 May, Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan, presidential security adviser Sydney Mufamadi and the Eskom board will appear before MPs to discuss corruption at Eskom. The following Tuesday, 9 May, it’s the turn of the Auditor-General, Special Investigating Unit (SIU), the Hawks, SAPS and State Security Agency (SSA).

That Gordhan and Mufamadi are first up relates directly to De Ruyter’s statement to MPs that he had regularly briefed and discussed matters of corruption and crime with the ministers, and specifically briefed both in mid-2022 on the intelligence-driven internal investigation into corruption and cartel-organised crime at Eskom.

“They were informed. They knew,” De Ruyter told MPs. “The lack of intervention in crime in Eskom is something that afflicts the institution to this day.”

Briefing Gordhan and Mufamadi might have come with an expectation these matters would be kicked upstairs to their political boss, President Cyril Ramaphosa. Not so, according to a presidential parliamentary written reply: “I was not briefed about the identities of people who are allegedly involved in cartels in Eskom.”

Exactly how Gordhan or Mufamadi respond to MPs about having been briefed about organised crime-level corruption at Eskom power stations — including dodgy coal, short fuel deliveries and overpayment on goods — will unfold when they appear before Scopa.

De Ruyter remained tight-lipped on names, repeatedly stating security apprehensions, as well as concerns of litigation against him and of defeating the ends of justice by inadvertently disclosing something that’s the subject of a criminal investigation.

But he maintained he had complied with the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act that requires anyone with knowledge of corruption over R100,000 to report that to a police officer. Eskom has an in-house reporting system that recorded 100 such incidents, and De Ruyter made a separate Section 34 disclosure to the Hawks after he left Eskom.

And he maintained it paid off — arrests have been made, prosecutions started, and the Hawks have raided “black sites”, where good quality coal is replaced with poor quality coal.

MPs’ questions were referred to the Hawks and the police for updates.

Scopa was referred to Gordhan regarding the “high-level politician” who told De Ruyter he would have to allow “some people to eat a little bit”, a comment that on Wednesday emerged was specifically linked to the $8.5-billion just energy transition funding offered to South Africa on the sidelines of COP26 in Glasgow in November 2021. A detailed spending plan has yet to be released.

“That’s a question best directed to Minister Gordhan,” De Ruyter replied to pressing by DA MP Alf Lees. “Yes, Minister Gordhan would be best to tell MPs... I told him.”

Micromanaging and interference

For accountability’s interest, Gordhan and the Eskom board would have to respond to statements about micromanaging and interference.

The minister had bypassed De Ruyter to go straight to power station level in his style of “being extremely involved”, said De Ruyter. “It made life as the responsible accounting officer quite difficult. Many cooks in the kitchen does not necessarily make a good meal.”

And the new “self-styled engaged” board under chairperson Mpho Makwana played a part in his resignation, De Ruyter told MPs.

“Meetings were held with subordinates of mine without my knowledge and instructions were given. I experienced that as disempowering... The engaged board did play a role in my life [as CEO] becoming untenable.”

Eskom, in a message posted on its media WhatsApp group, commented that “nothing new surfaced... that is not already dealt with by law enforcement agencies. Eskom remains steadfast on a path to restore the ethical fibre of the company.”

But in the bluster to deal with rotational power cuts as a 2024 election issue, accountability becomes obscured. This includes policy U-turns associated with factional and vested interests like extending ageing coal stations instead of decommissioning them, and spending billions on burning diesel to run open-cycle gas turbines to lower the impact of rolling power cuts.

Read more in Daily Maverick: South Africa’s Electricity Minister to Fight Outages With Diesel

This comes as Parliament’s rules committee decided the electricity ministry in the Presidency will not get an oversight committee; the Presidency has no oversight committee. And Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa still awaits the President’s official delegation of powers.

It’s Scopa that’s left to untangle this Gordian Knot. DM

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A game plan emerges

Micromanaging and interference