Putting one or two new faces on Eskom’s board will not change the severe corruption at Eskom that has filtered down to project level at the utility and a task team needs to be sent in to clean the utility out, energy analyst Ted Blom said on Jacaranda FM online this weekend.
Blom, a well known energy industry specialist and commentator, said his estimates were that more than R500 billion has been lost at Eskom due to corruption over the past decade.
He said for instance, that in 2008, a crime syndicate in Eskom’s coal operations involving 54 people and a senior government minister “not far from the top” had syphoned off some R8 billion of Eskom in “emergency” spending where there had been no tender. He did not wish to disclose the name of the minister online.
He that said if Eskom’s operations were “fixed up” and some 30 000 jobs were cut at the utility as it was overstaffed to the extent of one in every three jobs, some three million jobs could be created through a rejuvenated economy at the cost of the 30 000 jobs.
He said fixing Eskom would result in far lower electricity tariff being paid by consumers.
His own calculations were that South Africa needed to pay 40 cents per kilowatt hour for electricity, while Eskom’s current base rate was R1.09 cents per kilowatt hour up to the first 300 kilowatt hour, with the rate escalating sharply thereafter.
BUSINESS REPORT