Gordhan names firms linked to R4bn Eskom overpayment, while NPA investigates former employees

Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan has written to ANC Chief Whip Pemmy Majodina naming contractors responsible for R4-billion overspend on the construction of Eskom’s Kusile power plant. Several former employees, Gordhan also revealed, are being probed by the NPA.

The R4-billion overpayment was made to Stefanutti Stocks-Basil Read Joint Venture, ABB South Africa and Tubular Construction Projects. Each was paid R1-billion while a further R735-million went to Tenova Mining and Minerals SA.  

Various site service contracts not within the scope of a Special Investigation Unit (SIU) probe totalled R180-million, Gordhan added.

Gordhan, in his note to Majodina, also sought to clear up a “misunderstanding” that Eskom had overpaid Tegeta R5-billion when in fact Eskom had a R5-billion claim against the company. Tegeta, which owns the Optimum coal mine, was owned by the Gupta family’s Oakbay.

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-11-26-top-eskom-contractors-in-fresh-r75m-kusile-slush-fund-scandal/#gsc.tab=0

In October 2018, when Optimum went into business rescue, Eskom had submitted a claim of approximately R5.5-billion. 

The claim comprised R1.13-billion (1.1 million tons of coal) for September 2016 to January 2018 (pre-commencement of business rescue) and a further R4.4-billion (3.8 million tons of coal) for February 2018 to December 2018 ( after commencement of business rescue).

However, in December 2019, at a meeting of creditors, the quantum of Eskom’s claim had been challenged and Eskom’s claim was referred to an independent expert for determination.

At an arbitration hearing in March 2020 the majority of creditors (excluding Oakbay), Eskom and the business rescue practitioners reached an agreement that Eskom’s claim would be pegged at around R1.3-billion.

Gordhan’s response to Majodina, dated 6 July 2020, was prompted by communication from the Standing Committee on Appropriations (SCOA) in February 2020 requesting that Eskom provide a progress report on investigations into the overpayment of contractors.

An Eskom report attached to Gordhan’s letter indicated that the utility has referred several cases to the NPA and that many of the employees implicated in the inflated contracts had since resigned.

The report set out that ABB had been appointed through a closed procurement tender strategy to work on the Hitachi boiler and Alstom turbine combination used by the utility. Other bidders had been Siemens and Maul Bilfinger.

The ABB tender was higher than that of Siemens, “however, due to technical price adjustments made to the Siemens tender, ABB emerged as the cheaper option”.

The adjustments, which bumped Siemens out of the competition, the report found, had been used by Eskom’s then-management to award the contract to ABB. 

Once work commenced, ABB had been issued “four major variation orders with no substantiation documentation or records”, the report found.

“These variation orders do not have all the requisite particulars to assess or verify the delays or costs claimed and were grossly inflated.” 

The SIU was in the process of finalising an investigation into ABB and initial engagements had resulted in “ABB verbally offering to pay back approximately R240m”.

In August 2019 the SIU informed Eskom that it was investigating the Tenova contract for potential overpayment and confirmed two months later that evidence had been referred to the NPA.

With regard to the overpayment of Stefanutti Stocks Basil Read (SSBR) and Stefanutti Stocks Izazi JV (SSIJV), the Eskom report found the utility’s representative and contracts manager at the time (2015 to 2018) had made interim payments without the requisite substantiation.