SA's electricity crisis | Eskom board open to partnerships

JOHANNESBURG - The Eskom board is open to any partnership that could ease the pressure on the power utility.

But the era of state capture in the country has made them weary of giving up too much control.

READ: SONA 2023 | Eskom to study disaster declaration

Board chair Mpho Makwana says they are investigating ways to combine existing skills with international best practices.

"If you look at the fact that Eskom, by its nature, has had a global footprint historically -- we've had lots of global partnerships with other players," Makwana told Prof JJ Tabane on Power To Truth.

READ: Gordhan: Eskom contractors to be held accountable

"I mean, people tend to forget that since being in the nuclear business in the 70s, we've been doing this in partnership with among others the French EDF, so there is a sharing of best practices that we have access to but what we do need to remember, back to what I said about what the nine or ten years of state capture have done, is that in some instances perhaps there may have been a sense of overzealousness in promoting people to run power stations before they're ready.

"Part of what our board operational performance committee is doing is looking at where it makes sense to cross-pollinate some of that talent, looking at how you pay attention to those power stations that are not doing well. We've also got 6 power stations that we've said we're prioritising for fixing and also helping to ensure that they deliver.))