Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa. (Leon Sadiki/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
President Cyril Ramaphosa will expedite the matter of Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa receiving powers which potentially will see him taking over control of the Eskom board, the ANC confirmed to the Mail & Guardian on Tuesday.
This is after Ramokgopa made a plea to the ruling party’s national working committee (NWC) for the government to give him more powers over the Eskom board so that he can execute his duties.
In an interview with the M&G on Tuesday, ANC spokesperson Mahlengi Bhengu-Motsiri said the matter had been resolved during the NWC meeting on Monday.
“The top seven discussed this matter and the president reflected on it also in his remarks and that he is expediting this thing in fact it is settled. The word settled meaning all the powers that are requisite, subject to taking care of proclamations and the necessary regulations because remember this is a position that did not exist,” she said.
“In so doing I would imagine as president he needed to look at no loopholes created between what Sputla [Ramokgopa] should rightly be empowered to do alongside that of his two counterpart departments.”
Bhengu-Motsiri said there was “overall” satisfaction in the NWC with the pace with which the president was now moving to sort out Ramokgopa’s dilemma.
“The position of the ANC has been very clear and on record. The very fact that the top seven has met with the president on this issue is indicative of the urgent strife and haste with which the ANC is taking it seriously. It’s very rare that national officials would isolate one singular issue and pursue it in that manner,” she said.
The M&G reported last week that the NWC meeting had to adjourn early after its members mandated its top officials to consider handing over powers of the power utility to the electricity minister. Legislation will have to be amended for Eskom powers to be handed over from the minister of public enterprises.
The matter of Ramokgopa’s powers was a point of contention in October, when the party held its ordinary national executive committee (NEC) meeting.
In May, after calls for Ramokgopa to receive more powers to execute his duties, Ramaphosa stripped Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe of his powers under the Electricity Regulation Act and transferred them to the electricity minister.
In the May statement, the presidency said Ramaphosa had also transferred to Ramokgopa the powers and functions set out in section 34(2) of the Electricity Regulation Act. Section 34 of the Act allows Ramokgopa to determine whether new generation capacity is needed to ensure the continued uninterrupted supply of electricity.
In October, the national executive committee (NEC) called for Ramokgopa to have more powers to work more closely with the Eskom board. The NEC is said to have been of the opinion that to eliminate the governance problems at Eskom, Ramokgopa should oversee the board — at least in the short term.
Ramaphosa then asked for time to look at this possibility in terms of legislation and the law.