Struggling state-owned power utility Eskom will not be able to publish its financial results for the year ended March 2022 by the statutory end of September deadline.
Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan said in a letter to the speaker of parliament, dated September 26, that delays in finalising an external audit of Eskom’s results for the 2021/2022 financial year was one of the factors contributing to the delay.
According to Gordhan “auditors have identified […] significant key matters that will take some time to close out”.
In addition, Eskom had to appoint new auditors, but due to late completion of the audit for the financial year ended March 31 2021, the finalisation of these appointments was delayed. As a result, the audit for the financial year ended March 31 2022 started late.
The indications are that the auditors will only be able to sign off the utility’s annual financial statements towards the end of October or beginning of November, Gordhan said
Eskom released a statement on Thursday saying that due to the delayed appointment of the external auditors as announced on November 4 2021 and the extensive process of taking on a new audit, as well as the time it has taken to resolve several issues that were raised during the audit, its financial statements were anticipated to be published by the end of November.
It was in the process of resolving anticipated restatements to its previously issued audited financial statements for the prior year ended March 31 2021, which will have an affect on the group’s statements of financial position and income statement, Eskom said.
This included the reclassification of coal stocks from current assets to noncurrent assets, reclassification of certain electricity debtors from current to noncurrent, and “various adjustments to property, plant and equipment, which include assets for which incorrect useful lives have been used, extension of asset useful lives not accounted for”.
During the National Energy Regulator of SA’s (Nersa’) public hearings that were held last week to deliberate on Eskom’s tariff application for the 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 financial years, some commentators asked if it were prudent to decide on future tariffs when the previous year’s financial statements were not yet available.
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