SO NOW it is “official”, at least very large in the government rumour mill. The President himself ordered the inquiry into Eskom’s management which resulted in the “temporary” suspension of the chief executive and three other senior executives.
If this is indeed true then JZ has at last awoken to the potential of the Eskom crisis for national economic collapse. But then he’s forgotten that he appointed his deputy to resolve the more serious issues at Eskom, also that he evidently issued other instructions to ensure that Deputy President Ramaphosa has no means of carrying out his mission and prevent Eskom’s inexorable slide into total failure. It is inconceivable for the president to permit his deputy to be successful.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, Patrick Motsepe and African Rainbow Minerals have announced that they are taking their manganese smelters to Malaysia where power is cheaper and reliable, but this earth-shattering news is like water off the duck’s back of the Presidency.
If Eskom is not good enough for the country’s most successful black industrialist then what hope does it have of regaining the confidence of the rest of industry?
Also in the real world, we have Eskom’s Mike Rossouw getting down and dirty in the management of the power stations.
Evidently, Rossouw has found that the power station managers are unsure as to what their “key performance indicators” are. So the list has been shortened to the critical indicators, to facilitate commitment to memory, and “energy availability” has been added. Energy availability apparently refers to a power station’s on-line factor, what others refer to, in simple terms, as station reliability.
Semantics apart, what is scarcely credible is that energy availability was previously not of significance to the power station manager – surely, nothing the manager does could possibly be of more importance?
It’s scarcely conceivable that Eskom’s management is now that poor, particularly after its achievements of the 1980s.
Ramaphosa and his war room need look no further than power station management for the solution to their problem, simply replace the managers with competent personnel, that is if it complies with JZ’s other instructions. It certainly doesn’t help sending senior managers from Megawatt Park to the power stations to oversee maintenance.
This will only ensure that the power station managers are even more confused, apart from proving that the senior managers are totally redundant as their absence from Megawatt Park will not be noticed. Maybe simple excision of a whole layer of redundant personnel would be part of the solution. At least it improves communication and the savings would pay for a few megalitres of diesel for the gas turbines.
Roger Toms
Hout Bay
Why need a middleman?
AS an outsider, can somebody tell me why large companies and municipalities, who are users of huge quantities of commodities such as petroleum products and coal, as in the case of Eskom, need to have a middleman to supply the goods rather than deal directly with the source of these products?
Surely they would get a lower price by using their own buying departments than when having to pay for an intermediary who will probably charge exorbitant handling fees?
It is like having various government departments and parastatals employing consultants to do the job, instead of having experts who should be full time employees, or of having “temporary” employees in permanent positions for many years, such as in the Post Office and education departments.
Simon Price
Welkom, Free State