In this Q&A session with the BizNews tribe, Eskom chair Mteto Nyati addressed critical issues surrounding South Africa’s energy crisis, particularly focusing on the ongoing challenges of loadshedding. He reflected on the company’s past struggles, emphasizing the need for a data-driven approach to enhance efficiency and reduce operational costs. Nyati acknowledged the complexities of leadership within Eskom, noting the importance of learning from previous management while prioritizing the identification and resolution of current problems. He also highlighted the commitment of Eskom employees to restore the utility to its former glory, underscoring a collective desire for positive change amidst a turbulent energy landscape. Nyati’s insights offer a glimpse into future strategies aimed at stabilizing South Africa’s electricity supply and rebuilding public trust in Eskom.
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Highlights from the interview
In this Q&A session, Eskom chair Mteto Nyati discussed the ongoing challenges of loadshedding and the company’s path to recovery. He highlighted the significant savings from reduced diesel usage, projecting that Eskom could see profitability sooner than expected due to reliable machinery and government debt relief. Nyati emphasized the importance of proven technologies, particularly from countries like France and Russia, as Eskom seeks to enhance its energy mix, including nuclear, solar, wind, and gas.
Addressing concerns about staffing, he acknowledged the need for organizational efficiency and the importance of data in decision-making. While he refrained from commenting extensively on former CEO Andre de Ruyter, Nyati recognized the value of bringing corruption to light and affirmed ongoing efforts to address it. He stressed the necessity of listening to employees for insights that can inform strategic direction.
Nyati conveyed optimism about the future, emphasizing that most Eskom employees are dedicated to restoring the utility to its former standards. His commitment to transparency and collaboration reflects a proactive approach to overcoming the challenges facing South Africa’s energy sector and rebuilding public trust in Eskom.
Edited transcript of the interview ___STEADY_PAYWALL___
00:00:13:24 – 00:00:45:03
Alec Hogg:
Fascinating how the modern world gives you the tools to combat the bad guys. There were many questions during the second part of our conversation, and I’m going to kick them off and once again pose them to you, as I did at the conference. Rory Steyn’s question was about the plan to recover billions owed to Eskom from municipalities or for poor workmanship, particularly at Medupi and Kusile.
00:00:45:04 – 00:01:08:20
Alec Hogg:
It’s an interesting question because, subsequent to our conference, we’ve seen Mark Lomas — who, I’m sure you recall, used to be the chief executive of Group Five, a major JSE-listed company — being extradited back to South Africa to explain R1.4 billion worth of corruption that occurred with a senior contract manager.
00:01:08:21 – 00:01:15:08
Alec Hogg:
But I guess Rory’s question was, is Eskom going to pursue these guys?
00:01:15:10 – 00:01:36:24
Mteto Nyati:
Absolutely. This is very, very important for us. Both the Eskom employees involved in these activities and the people they’re working with — regardless of who they are or which organizations they work for, big or small companies — we don’t care. We are going after them.
00:01:37:08 – 00:02:09:17
Mteto Nyati:
The police, the SIU, and the NPA have been quite helpful here. Again, we’re working very closely with the government through structures like MiCOM and the National Energy Crisis Committee. That committee has been helpful in bringing together various organs to help us address this. In the past, the quality of information was an issue. That’s where our work around AI comes into play. It gives us a good picture and helps us move things forward.
00:02:09:17 – 00:02:40:11
Mteto Nyati:
Regarding municipalities, they owe us close to R86 billion. To me, this reflects what’s wrong with our society — where metros collect money from the public, from consumers, but don’t pay Eskom. It says a lot about the values of our society. That’s why we have taken a strong stance. You may have seen what we did with Emfuleni, where we attached three of their bank accounts to force them to pay us. We had to resort to such measures because we need to be prioritized.
00:02:40:13 – 00:03:25:01
Mteto Nyati:
This is the action we’ll continue to take, whether it’s the City of Johannesburg or the City of Tshwane. We want to be paid. Ultimately, there’s no such thing as a free lunch; all of this has to be paid by someone. We need these organizations, especially the big metros, to respect the rule of law. They have to pay what they owe and lead by example. That’s where we’re coming from. So yes, we’ll certainly do what needs to be done.
00:03:25:01 – 00:03:49:12
Alec Hogg:
What about those who constructed Medupi? We saw the example of Tubular Construction Company, where Mike Lomas was associated. They got a big contract and did shoddy work. There were others as well, like Hitachi, which even got into trouble in the United States for its work on some Eskom plants. What happens to them?
00:03:49:14 – 00:04:55:20
Mteto Nyati:
You may have seen organizations like ABB, which were involved in process and control instrumentation in some of these plants. They charged us double what they should have, but we pursued them along with the SIU. In fact, ABB paid back close to R2 to R3 billion to Eskom. So, there are ongoing activities that we’re working closely on with the SIU.
00:05:03:06 – 00:05:12:04
Alec Hogg:
Piet Viljoen’s question was: what are the chances Eskom goes into a death spiral and prices itself out of the market?
00:05:12:06 – 00:05:39:13
Mteto Nyati:
I don’t see that happening. As you’ve heard me say, our next priority after energy security is to address affordability. Many people think there’s a massive shift away from Eskom, and perhaps they wish that were the case. But in reality, it’s not happening.
00:05:39:15 – 00:06:13:17
Mteto Nyati:
The reality is that most businesses, as a matter of fact, may go the renewable route. They expect the base load to come from Eskom, you know. And if you look at the number of them now, I get asked to come and present to boards and to some industry organizations. Why? Because people are looking at their investments. They’ve got limited funds, and if there’s reliable supply from Eskom, should they continue with the plans they had to go to XYZ? So, these are the things going through the minds of many boards. Many of them absolutely know that a reliable Eskom, available at a cost that is affordable, is still preferable to something else.
00:06:13:20 – 00:06:38:02
Mteto Nyati:
So, what we have done… I don’t see us pricing ourselves out. We are conscious of the costs. As we move into more renewables—bringing them in now because the cost curve of those renewables is quite low—we are going to be competitive and continue to drive down the cost of electricity.
00:06:38:04 – 00:07:03:02
Mteto Nyati:
So, I don’t see a problem. The key, though, is to make sure that we regain the trust of the public. We’re not there yet, and we have to continue delivering. Many businesses are very, very supportive of what we are doing, and they are even putting on hold some of their capital expenditure plans.
00:07:03:04 – 00:07:25:12
Alec Hogg:
We’ve gone past 175 days now of no load shedding. Perhaps you could also unpack for us what you told the delegates at the conference about the load shedding scenario. When do you expect it will be almost guaranteed that there will be no more load shedding?
00:07:25:17 – 00:08:18:23
Mteto Nyati:
Yeah. So, one of the things we did when this board was announced in October 2022 was spend a lot of time engaging with the power station general managers, together with the then-CEO. We tried to understand what the issues were. For us as a board, it was very important that whatever plan we came up with addressed the real problems. From there, we realized that we had diagnosed the problem incorrectly. The issue wasn’t so much an aging fleet but rather the unreliability of the fleet. This may sound like semantics, but it’s not. If the problem was just an aging fleet, we’d say, “I don’t want to spend good money chasing bad things—let these power stations retire.”
00:08:19:00 – 00:09:15:02
Mteto Nyati:
That was the prevailing view at the time, but we came to a different conclusion: no, we can fix these power stations and bring them back to a point of reliability. We developed a plan called the Generation Recovery Plan, which was a two-year plan, approved by the board in March last year. Our expectation was that by the end of March this year (2024), we would have an energy availability factor (EAF) of 65%, up from 51% a year ago. Then, by the end of March 2025, we expect an EAF of 70%.
00:09:15:04 – 00:10:16:20
Mteto Nyati:
We are already at 65%, in line with the plan. There are several actions to get us to 70%. When we reach that point, we’ll have enough reserve margin. We typically need a 10 to 15% reserve margin above demand, and on some days this year, we’ve already hit that level. But until we complete all the work we’ve planned, we won’t declare victory too soon. Still, we expect that by the end of March next year, we should be in that position.
00:10:50:20 – 00:11:09:09
Alec Hogg:
That’s really good news. And I guess from that perspective, there can be further investments by those companies that have now postponed their investments in their own renewables. On the reliability factor, Steve Koelin Brand’s question was: What did Eskom get so wrong?
Read more: Nyati – how Eskom’s killing loadshedding, creating surplus
00:11:09:11 – 00:11:32:20
Mteto Nyati:
Look, I think there are a number of things we got right. Let me put it this way: a number of things came together to get us to where we are. First, having people on the board who are much more engaged, that’s important. You know, asking questions, not just taking what you’re being told and moving on with that.
00:11:32:22 – 00:11:56:19
Mteto Nyati:
Trying to get to the root of the problem. Unfortunately, when you go that route, sometimes you can make people uncomfortable—I’m talking about management—but it’s our responsibility as the board to continue asking questions. It’s not to do management’s job, but to ask questions so that we can have a good understanding of what’s going on. That was one thing that happened.
00:11:56:19 – 00:12:24:04
Mteto Nyati:
Once you have a clear understanding of the issues, you ask yourself, “Do I have the resources to address the problem in front of me?” In this case, we found that Eskom’s relationship with the original equipment manufacturers was no longer there. We were working through intermediaries, and most of those companies did not have the expertise required to help us fix the machines when they were down.
00:12:24:06 – 00:12:55:24
Mteto Nyati:
So, we restored those relationships. And when I say “restored,” it may sound easy, but this involved engaging with the national treasury and getting the necessary approvals for Eskom to do this, as part of government policy. That’s a big deal. Now, when you’re taking the machines for maintenance, you know they will come back in better condition than when you sent them out. In the past, machines would come back in a worse condition, which was a problem.
00:12:56:06 – 00:13:21:07
Mteto Nyati:
So that’s the second big thing that had to be done. Then, leadership—this is one of the most important aspects—leadership at all levels. Starting with generation leadership, where the organization was being led by someone in an acting capacity, they couldn’t make decisions. When you’re in an acting role, you’re uncomfortable making big decisions. We had to accelerate the appointment of a permanent leader.
00:13:21:09 – 00:13:50:16
Mteto Nyati:
We, as the board, were part of the panel that conducted the interviews, supporting the process to ensure we got the right person. We found that right person within Eskom. It wasn’t impossible; we literally looked at the people provided by the recruitment agency and felt they didn’t understand the brief. Long story short, we managed to get Bheki Nxumalo, who became the leader overseeing the power stations.
00:13:50:23 – 00:14:13:14
Mteto Nyati:
He assessed his entire team, asking whether he had the right leaders in the power stations. He knew the people within the organization, knew who had the right experience in which power stations, and managed to bring back those who had been sidelined into roles they now occupy.
00:14:13:14 – 00:14:41:23
Mteto Nyati:
Another important factor was that Eskom staff, as a whole, had faced what I call “collective punishment”—no salary increases for five years. You might think they didn’t deserve increases because we didn’t have the lights on, but that’s the wrong approach. If you want to drive change, you must recognize that most people in the organization are trying to do the right thing. We were able to restore some of that.
00:14:42:00 – 00:15:21:02
Mteto Nyati:
Another critical tool we lacked was short-term incentives. If you want to drive certain behaviors, you need to have incentives that are linked to performance.
00:15:59:24 – 00:16:23:14
Mteto Nyati:
You know, right now, we’re no longer driving things from the center, trying to crack the whip and do this or that. It’s largely driven by the incentive structure we’ve created, where people at the power stations are competing with one another for excellence. You know, that’s what you want. You want an environment where people aspire to high performance.
00:16:23:16 – 00:16:56:19
Mteto Nyati:
A combination of all these things, together with the minister, the late Pravin Gordhan, who was very supportive in removing the issues related to government, made a big difference. You know, it was the government that said there should be no salary increases, removed short-term incentives, and took away the board’s responsibility for executive pay. We had to get all of those things back. You need a board that is empowered and able to drive its agenda. He helped us get to that point. We were also supported by the Minister of Energy and Electricity, especially when Andrew left and we didn’t have a CEO.
00:16:56:19 – 00:17:30:06
Mteto Nyati:
At that time, we worked very closely with the minister. He became the person who was the communication link, both for the government and for us.
00:17:30:06 – 00:17:37:24
Alec Hogg:
And managing upwards, given that you’ve got a shareholder. You’ve mentioned the late Pravin Gordhan, the Minister of Energy and Electricity. What also came out strongly in your talk was that there had been very little communication between Eskom and its shareholder.
00:17:38:01 – 00:18:23:23
Mteto Nyati:
Yes. You know, I’ve been a CEO before, and part of a CEO’s role is really to focus on managing stakeholders. Whether it’s the investor community, employees, or the government, all of that is the responsibility of the leader of an organization. When Dan joined the company, we told him not to spend time with the media, at least for the first 100 days. His job was to focus on understanding the issues. Look under the hood, get to the bottom of the problems, and then review the plan already in place. If you want to make changes, do so, but you must own it. It can’t be someone else’s plan anymore.
00:18:24:00 – 00:19:06:00
Mteto Nyati:
So, for the first 100 days, Dan had to understand what was going on and review the existing plan. Another thing was that Eskom needed to participate in renewables as an entity, and we wanted him to come back with a clear strategy on how that would happen. Thirdly, we needed to rebuild our relationships with different stakeholders. I was asked, as chairman, to introduce him to various stakeholders, particularly in the government. I would set up meetings, for example, with Minister Mantashe and others.
00:19:06:00 – 00:20:03:01
Mteto Nyati:
I was very surprised when we met with the minister and he said to me, “You know, the last time we had a meeting like this was probably nine or ten years ago.” I thought, “Wow.” These ministries that you need to influence — you may not always agree with them, but it doesn’t matter. Since you operate under them, you need to find a way to work with them, influence them, and create an environment that’s conducive to your organization’s success. So, we had to reestablish those connections that had been completely broken.
00:20:48:19 – 00:21:03:23
Alec Hogg
George Nikolakakis asked about the status of criminal organizations that we read so much about in André de Ruyter’s book and their tentacles within Eskom.
00:21:04:00 – 00:21:54:07
Mteto Nyati
Look, as I’ve already indicated, the work we’ve done through the use of AI has helped us gain a good understanding of who is involved within the organization and their connections with people and companies external to Eskom. To address this, we set up, as a board, an office within the Office of the CEO that deals directly with this issue. We capacitated that office and brought in support from the private sector to help with drafting these cases and speeding things up. We also ensured there is no bias, as sometimes employees might be lenient towards those they know. External support is helping us address this.
00:21:54:07 – 00:22:19:09
Mteto Nyati
The other important step we’ve taken is putting the right leaders in charge of different power stations. That was crucial because if you have leaders who aren’t leading or managers who aren’t managing, chaos ensues. By bringing in people with discipline who can ensure things are done properly, it creates order.
00:22:19:11 – 00:22:55:23
Mteto Nyati
For example, if I receive a delivery from a company of a certain amount of coal, I need to check whether I really got what I ordered—both in terms of quantity and quality. If I only realize there’s a discrepancy six months later, that’s clearly a problem on my side. I should be able to check immediately or the day after. Having the right leaders eliminates some of the chaos because previously, no one was paying attention to these things. Bheki’s work in appointing the right leaders at some power stations has gone a long way.
00:22:55:23 – 00:23:20:10
Mteto Nyati
It has also improved staff morale. People working in an organization need to know where they are headed. They don’t want to work in a chaotic environment. They want to know that if they show up and do well, their efforts will be recognized. In a situation where whether you apply yourself or not makes no difference, people won’t be motivated to give their best.
00:23:20:10 – 00:23:45:22
Mteto Nyati
That’s why I keep emphasizing that leadership matters—it matters at all levels. It creates the right environment for people who want to excel. For those who don’t perform, leaders must have tough conversations with them, either helping them improve or moving them out. That’s what we’re starting to see more and more within Eskom now.
00:23:45:24 – 00:24:03:03
Alec Hogg
Leadership, leadership, leadership. Well, here’s a related question. Jabu Ncube asked: Does Eskom have a succession plan to ensure that the next group of leaders is as efficient as the current leadership?
00:24:03:05 – 00:25:03:12
Mteto Nyati
Yes, as a board, we have a responsibility to ensure there is succession planning, especially for key executive roles within Eskom. That is a priority for us. We are currently working with Dan to bring in leaders at the executive level within Eskom. As we do this, succession planning is always at the forefront of our minds.
00:25:40:12 – 00:26:08:00
Mteto Nyati
Yes, I am bringing someone for this role. But you have to ask yourself, can this person do the job? Do they have the capacity to do it? That’s what we’re focused on right now, and I’m comfortable with the work being driven by our Human Capital and Remuneration Committee, together with management, to build that.
Read more: FT: Eskom chair Nyati says the utility is “fixed”, loadshedding over
00:26:08:00 – 00:26:31:24
Mteto Nyati
One of the recommendations we made to the minister is that when the board is being rotated or changed, in the past, they would remove all members at once and bring in a new board. We need a plan for continuity; otherwise, some of the good work can be undone.
00:26:31:24 – 00:26:54:03
Mteto Nyati
We are coming to the end of our term in October next year. If the entire board were removed, that would pose a significant problem. So we have made recommendations, which I believe are supported by the minister, to keep at least two-thirds of the board.
00:26:54:06 – 00:27:21:06
Mteto Nyati
Yes, we can remove a head or two and bring in new members, but we should keep at least two-thirds to ensure continuity. If that approach works here, it could be something we recommend to other state-owned enterprises as well.
00:27:21:08 – 00:27:32:03
Alec Hogg
Tim Aiken’s question was: How will Eskom manage to solve its debt issue and make tariffs more competitive for industry?
00:27:32:05 – 00:28:07:24
Mteto Nyati
Our debt situation is, I think, largely solvable. When the government of South Africa decided to support Eskom with approximately 260 billion rand last year, that was, of course, over a three-year period. It wasn’t an immediate injection that would completely change Eskom’s balance sheet.
00:28:08:01 – 00:28:39:12
Mteto Nyati
That support is very important. However, we don’t want to reach a point in five or ten years where we need the government to bail us out again. So, that’s the first thing that has helped a lot. The next step is to ensure the generation fleet is reliable so we can sell the electricity we produce.
00:28:39:14 – 00:29:02:23
Mteto Nyati
Load shedding was detrimental to Eskom’s business because it resulted in lost sales. If you look at the last four months, the year-on-year growth in our top line is something we are very pleased with. That growth is essential, and we need to maintain it for the full year.
00:29:03:21 – 00:29:31:04
Mteto Nyati
The second important factor is that because we are not doing load shedding, we do not need to purchase as much diesel. Last year, during maintenance, we spent 33 billion rand on diesel to minimize the impact of load shedding while deliberately taking equipment offline for maintenance.
00:29:31:04 – 00:30:01:12
Mteto Nyati
We used open cycle gas turbines, which are typically supposed to operate at a load factor of around 7%. However, we were running them at load factors of around 24%. Currently, year-to-date, the load factor is way below 7%, sitting at about 2.5%. That’s how it should be; these machines should only be used during peak times, like in winter during the morning or evening peaks, for just one or two hours.
00:30:41:20 – 00:31:09:10
Mteto Nyati
And that’s how these machines were designed to be used. Think about it: we spent 33 billion rand on diesel last year. This year, we will hardly reach 8 billion rand. All of that is savings, supported by reliable machines. That is very important for our bottom line.
00:31:09:14 – 00:31:47:16
Mteto Nyati
The third element is the debt relief from the government, which helps us reduce our interest charges. That’s a significant saving as well. So, combining all of this, I believe we will likely reach profitability sooner than most South Africans think, thanks to the reliability of our machines, top line growth, savings on diesel, and the support we receive from the government.
00:31:47:18 – 00:31:57:01
Alec Hogg
Richard Hirsch’s question is: When will Eskom allow households to feed back into the grid? He says he’s been waiting for 14 months for this.
00:31:57:03 – 00:32:28:04
Mteto Nyati
Yes, a lot of work has been done around this. You may recall the time of the feed-in tariffs. What you need is a meter that can facilitate this. By the end of this year, Eskom has indicated that people must upgrade their meters in preparation for that reality.
00:32:28:04 – 00:32:57:16
Mteto Nyati
Once we have all the meters in our homes upgraded and a model that allows people to feed into the grid, we will also need approval from the NERSA. NERSA is working on this. I can’t remember the name of the mechanism they’re using for net billing, which looks at what you have bought and what you have sold to Eskom.
00:32:58:24 – 00:33:18:07
Mteto Nyati
That is what they are currently working on.
00:33:18:09 – 00:33:23:09
Alec Hogg
Bruce’s question is: What is Eskom’s view on nuclear power?
00:33:24:04 – 00:33:48:05
Mteto Nyati
Nuclear power is an interesting topic. If you look at the costs of different energy sources, nuclear is one of the cheapest. We prioritize the energy sources that cost us the least. It’s painful when we have to dispatch more expensive sources instead of coal.
00:33:48:05 – 00:34:14:11
Mteto Nyati
Koeberg has performed well; it’s one of the cheapest and most reliable, and, of course, it’s clean. We have never really encountered safety issues with nuclear power in South Africa. We need to continue developing that expertise in our country.
00:34:14:13 – 00:35:09:12
Mteto Nyati
The discussions around nuclear investment are intriguing. As our coal power stations reach the end of their operational life, if we can replace them with smaller nuclear power stations, we won’t have to invest as a country in transmission lines. These small modular power stations can be distributed widely, and we believe that is the right way to move forward.
00:35:09:12 – 00:35:36:23
Mteto Nyati
We are open to this and encouraging it as part of our future plans. For us, a clean energy transition involves nuclear, solar, wind, and also gas as a transitional technology.
00:35:37:00 – 00:35:57:03
Alec Hogg
That follows up on another question asked by Pete Low, who mentioned the pebble bed modular reactors that South Africa invested in but later abandoned. Is that being reconsidered?
00:35:57:09 – 00:36:27:24
Mteto Nyati
Right now, we are not in a position to explore untested technologies. While it was beneficial for the country to invest in and innovate around that, given the challenges we face regarding trust and the financial state of the country, it would be irresponsible to pursue such options at this time.
00:36:28:08 – 00:36:55:03
Mteto Nyati
Right now, our thinking is that we want to adopt proven technology. The countries that have these proven technologies include France, Russia, and a few others. We will likely look at that. The technology we’re using in Koeberg is from France.
00:36:55:05 – 00:37:24:17
Alec Hogg
Michael Potts, we’re coming to the end of our list of questions for you. He wanted to know if Eskom will consider the pebble bed technology. It wasn’t Pete; my apologies. Mike Wylie asked a rather controversial question: When will Eskom cut down its bloated staff, many of whom are inept and corrupt?
00:37:24:19 – 00:37:39:19
Mteto Nyati
In answering that question, I remember the presentation made by Marius, who was the gentleman who presented first.
00:37:39:21 – 00:37:41:11
Alec Hogg
That was Frans Cronje.
00:37:41:13 – 00:38:10:20
Mteto Nyati
Frans Cronje, yes. One of his observations about South Africa was that we are not a country of extremes; general South Africans are largely in the middle. They are not radical. I think that’s a good observation.
00:38:10:22 – 00:38:36:08
Mteto Nyati
We often get worried during elections and think, “Oh, we should know South Africans better by now.” They have never disappointed us. You can hear all these voices from the far right or far left, but they never attract the majority of South Africans. Most South Africans are really in the middle.
00:38:36:10 – 00:39:20:17
Mteto Nyati
I make this point to emphasize that, within any organization, I have found that many South Africans are trying to do the right thing. The majority of people genuinely want to do the right thing, and that’s no different at Eskom. In fact, it’s even more apparent now that we’ve done this work. The percentages align with my theory that the majority of Eskom employees just want to do the right thing.
00:39:20:19 – 00:39:45:16
Mteto Nyati
Moreover, when I look at how much information we receive from Eskom employees highlighting issues with certain individuals, it’s encouraging. Your tool, the aid tool, provides this information and gets corroborated by people on the ground, saying, “Hey, so-and-so is doing wrong things.”
00:39:45:18 – 00:40:19:03
Mteto Nyati
That’s a positive sign. Most of our employees are dedicated individuals who care deeply about the company. They want to see it return to its glory days, and they’re working with management to root out the wrong people. Regarding the point about staff size, I’ve already mentioned this.
00:40:19:03 – 00:40:48:09
Mteto Nyati
I think our next phase as an organization involves benchmarking ourselves against other players in the industry to evaluate the number of employees and various other metrics. We need to assess how efficiently Eskom is operating. This is where I think it’s going to be painful.
00:40:48:09 – 00:41:08:20
Mteto Nyati
In the next phase, as we move away from the past, we need to address costs. If we are not efficient in certain areas, that needs to be rectified. That’s a leadership responsibility, and it must be supported by data; it has to be evidence-based.
00:41:08:22 – 00:41:12:13
Mteto Nyati
We are currently working on that.
00:41:12:15 – 00:41:22:12
Alec Hogg
The last question from Mark Taylor is: Where did André go wrong, and what did he do right? Referring to André de Ruyter.
00:41:22:14 – 00:42:01:18
Mteto Nyati
I prefer not to comment on the personal details of any organization I am part of. It’s not the responsibility of current leaders to discuss past leaders. Our focus should always be on identifying problems and fixing them because we are not paid to criticize those who came before us. Our job is to address the issues at hand.
00:42:02:13 – 00:42:25:24
Mteto Nyati
However, I believe he did the right thing by highlighting some of the corruption within Eskom. He was not wrong to do that. We have built on the groundwork he laid to take it to the next level, acknowledging that while he had a feeling there was corruption, we now know who is responsible, and we are taking action against those individuals.
00:42:26:01 – 00:42:58:11
Mteto Nyati
To me, that was brave of him to speak out. I think he could have spent more time on the ground, trying to understand and listen to the people within Eskom who understand the environment better.
00:42:59:14 – 00:43:34:16
Mteto Nyati
In my experience as a CEO, I’ve always invested significant time in listening before formulating a strategy. The people closest to the problems have insights that should be integrated into your strategy, and I believe he could have done much more in that regard.
00:43:35:01 – 00:44:00:17
Mteto Nyati
You also need the support of people within your organization. I think he had a lot of external support, but what surprised me was the lack of internal support, which is dangerous. If no one is following you, then who are you really leading?
00:44:00:19 – 00:44:13:10
Mteto Nyati
That’s a problem. Those are the observations I have, but I generally prefer not to comment on past leaders.
00:44:13:12 – 00:44:39:11
Alec Hogg
Thank you again for devoting your time to us. Thank you for being at the BizNews conference and for the inspirational talk you delivered there and here. I’m sure the message you’re conveying to South Africa will contribute to the uplifting information that seems to be emerging in our country at last.
00:44:39:13 – 00:44:44:19
Alec Hogg
Mteto Nyati is the chair of Eskom. I’m Alec Hogg from BizNews.com.
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