Eskom is on its way to recovery, with board chair Mteto Nyati predicting it would soon be able to operate without government bailouts.
Nyati said he was confident the power utility’s turnaround strategy would yield significant results and see it recover from its financial woes.
In July, the Financial Times reported Eskom would release figures showing a R15bn annual loss, largely due to diesel costs of R33bn and after having recorded a full-year loss of R23.2bn in 2023.
The government has thus far provided Eskom with debt relief amounting to R254bn. The National Treasury said this would be in the form of advances of R78bn in 2023/24, R66bn in 2024/25 and R40bn in 2025/26.
Nyati has until 2025 to fulfil his mandate.
He said that while an end to load-shedding was one of the main objectives, the board and its executive were also aiming for a business turnaround and an end to corruption.
“Once we have significantly reduced our debt levels, once we are able to deliver profits for the business, and we’re able to do that over time, then we’ll say we would have turned around this business ... is Eskom ever going to be able to stand on its own two feet? Our view is that yes, and that is going to be actually soon.”
Nyati was appointed Eskom chair in October 2023. Under his and Eskom CEO Dan Marokane’s leadership, the country is on its way to a record six months without load-shedding.
Despite this achievement, Nyati said Eskom was not yet out of the woods.
“We are where we are, exactly where we thought we would be at this time,” he said. “About 18 months ago, when we set up this generation recovery plan, we set out a two-year plan. In two years we’ll be able to get to an energy availability factor of 70%. At that time, we feel we will be able to declare there’s not going to be any load-shedding.”
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