Crisis deepens at South African energy group
The embattled chief executive of Eskom is defying a board order to quit, extending the leadership crisis at South Africa’s giant state electricity company and underlining investor concerns about the reliability of the country’s power supply.Eskom's board insists CEO had quit
Private sector critics fear that an extended period of uncertainty will undermine the company’s ability to make progress with much-needed investment plans, raising the spectre of a return to power cuts that severely hit business confidence last year.
The board of South African power utility Eskom insisted on Wednesday that CE Jacob Maroga has resigned despite his denial, raising more questions about the leadership wrangle at the firm.2007: Eskom looks to nuclear plants
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Maroga's tenure has been marked by power shortages, a record loss of R9,7-billion in the year to March and electricity price rises criticised for stoking inflation as South Africa battles recession.
Eskom's chief executive Jacob Maroga told a coal conference on Tuesday the state-owned firm would cut back on polluting coal-fired plants that have made South Africa the world's lowest cost electricity producer.
"The issues we're faced with are costs and lead time, but the debate around global warming is key, because coal is a big contributor to carbon dioxide emissions," Maroga told the Coaltrans conference.
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Tom, I am an American missionary who has lived in South Africa for 16 years. The whole ESKOM debacle is another classic example of what happens when you have a para-statal (government involvement) monopoly in something like the energy sector. In typical African fashion there has been no foresight that the growth and expansion from 1994-2006 required more energy.
Now the WWF and GreenPeace are having a cadenza because ESKOM wants to build coal-fired power stations, which given the vast coal reserves in SA makes good common sense--something environmentalist are in supply of.
In Cape Town, where I live, there was talk of a pebble-bed reactor, but the eco-obstructionists came to the fore once again and mooted that. So here we are, in a couple of years it is all going to hit the proverbial fan and has the potential of rendering South Africa as just another 3rd world cesspool on the continent of Africa.
Sadly, where climate change is concerned, I am one of only a few skeptics in the whole country. What the masses need here is access to clean sanitation and energy, but between ESKOM and the climate change lies, they will be deprived these basic necessities once again. This could well lead to violence and anarchy, the likes of never seen here before.
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