Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan has shrugged off suggestions that his defence and support for former Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter was misplaced. Picture: ANA Archives
Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan has shrugged off suggestions that his defence and support for former Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter was misplaced.
Gordhan said as a shareholder representative he assisted the board of state-owned entities (SOEs) to meet their targets.
He also gave support to the CEOs of the entities.
EFF MP Omphile Maotwe asked him whether he conceded that his remarks about De Ruyter and that his steadfast defence and support of the former Eskom boss over the years was misplaced.
Gordhan said his support to the CEO of state owned entities was underpinned by good governance principles.
De Ruyter’s employment was terminated earlier this year after he gave an interview while he was serving notice of his resignation.
He had made allegations about corruption, criminal and maladministration at the SOE.
Asked if he took responsibility for the abysmal performance of De Ruyter as he played a role in his recruitment and defence, Gordhan said the CEO’s contract was with the board of directors and not with the shareholder representative.
He also said the CEO was responsible and accountable to the board for his performance, strategy implementation and the management of the affairs of the company.
“According to Eskom, the performance indicators for the Group Chief Executive are agreed to at the beginning of each financial year.
“These indicators are based on the shareholder’s compact.
“Performance at year-end is based on the achievement of the shareholders compact.”
He said the tenure of De Ruyter was disappointing as Eskom’s power stations energy availability factor (EAF) was 78% in 2018.
The EAF declined to 69.9% in 2019 and continued to be at 52% as at May this year.
Gordhan said at the time of announcement of the resignation of De Ruyter in December 2022, EAF was 57.2% with different levels of load shedding daily.
“As the executive authority, I intervened to assist in improving EAF. I have met with power station managers on numerous occasions as well as power station cluster managers in order to assist in improving the EAF performance,” he said.
Gordhan insisted that the entire recruitment process was managed by the then board in 2019.
He said the board formulated a shortlist of candidates and conducted the interviews before submitting two candidates for him to consider.
“Both candidates were engaged with by four ministers, whereafter the concurrence of cabinet was obtained.
“Ultimately the board is responsible for the performance of the CEO and management team.
“Despite the many efforts, as set out above, to assist the team, it would appear that, the CEO’s focus was misdirected. This is now receiving the attention of the new board,” Gordhan said.
In July 2022, the Cape Times reported that Gordhan threw his support to Eskom’s top two officials, saying they performed well beyond their performance agreements.
He was quoted as saying De Ruyter and former COO Jan Oberholzer were performing according to and beyond their agreed performance scorecards despite all the challenges facing the power utility.
“There had been a dramatic improvement in Eskom’s performance with an 85% improvement in earnings before interest, tax and depreciation.
“Eskom has also successfully reduced debt to R396 billion, from a previous high of R440 billion,” he said.
Gordhan had insisted that De Ruyter and the management knew what they were doing in turning around generation performance.
Cape Times
Related Topics: