The presence of SA National Defence Force (SANDF) troops at Eskom power stations in Mpumalanga has, so far, not had a noticeable effect on discouraging criminal activity there, Karen Pillay, the utility’s head of security, said on Wednesday.
The troops were deployed by President Cyril Ramaphosa in his capacity as the commander-in-chief of the SANDF a month ago to act as a deterrent for criminals who continue to target the utility.
While Eskom has not received any specific reports on suspected acts of sabotage at the stations where troops have been present since mid-December, Pillay said there had “certainly been criminal activity [at power stations] including at power stations where the SANDF is deployed”.
The state-owned power company has not had a good start to the year, having to implement stage 6 load-shedding during the evening on January 10 and then extending this stage to continuous implementation on Wednesday. This was after 11 generating units failed on Tuesday, bringing total unplanned outages to 18,000MW.
No load-shedding was implemented in January 2022.
Stage 6 load-shedding, when 6,000MW is dropped from the system, resulting in users facing intermittent power cuts of up to 10 hours per day, was implemented on six separate occasions during 2022, including three times during December.
Before ramping up the rotational power cuts to stage 6 in June last year, Eskom last had to drop this much power from the grid in December 2019.
Ramaphosa authorised the deployment of the SANDF at Eskom power stations across Mpumalanga on December 17 in response to the growing threat posed by theft, vandalism and corruption at the utility. Troops were first placed at Majuba, Camden, Grootvlei and Tutuka power stations in Mpumalanga and later also at Kriel, Duvha and Kendal power stations.
Eskom expects the deployment of SANDF troops to be extended to other power stations and it was awaiting further direction from the SANDF in this regard, Pillay said.
Multiple cases
Incidents of crime that have occurred since mid-December that are on record and under investigation include multiple cases of theft and attempted theft of copper cable, trespassing, break-ins at power stations, and one case of fraud, according to Eskom. The incidents occurred after the placement of troops.
At Duvha power station a case of suspected sabotage of the water treatment plant occurred on December 19. There were also suspected cases of fraud and copper cable theft reported at the station.
There were two cases of copper cable theft at Kendal power station in December, attempted copper cable theft at Tutuka and theft of cable from an air quality monitoring system at Camden.
Ramaphosa ordered the placement of troops after the resignation of Eskom CEO André de Ruyter, which was made public on December 14. It has since become known that there was an attempt on De Ruyter’s life on December 13 at Eskom’s head office, Megawatt Park in Johannesburg, where he drank a cup of coffee believed to have been laced with cyanide.
In an interview with Business Day in November last year, De Ruyter said Eskom was not getting sufficient support from the criminal justice system to act against those who get caught for crimes committed against Eskom and its employees.
He cited the recent arrest and subsequent release of an alleged coal thief by the Belfast magistrate’s court, saying that incidents like these made him question the criminal justice system’s commitment in combating crimes against the state.
In separate incidents in November, two truck drivers contracted to Eskom were arrested at Kendal after they were found in possession of stolen coal. A truck driver and his supervisor from a transport company subcontracted to haul coal to Eskom were arrested at Matla for being in possession of subgrade coal, a contractor working at Camden was arrested after he was positively linked to an incident of sabotage, and two guards employed by a security company contracted by Eskom to protect Port Rex Power Station in East London were arrested for stealing 5,863l of diesel valued at R145,930.
According to Pillay, for the six months from April to September last year Eskom suffered estimated losses of R222m because of criminal activity.
erasmusd@businesslive.co.za
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