Star 2023-01-16

Increase to pay for utility’s debt, huge wage bill, defaulting municipalities South Africa’s energy crisis has deepened further as public anger grows over lack of power supply amid rising electricity costs for consumers, business and industry. This comes after Eskom was given the green light to hike electricity tariffs by a cumulative 31.4% over the next two consecutive years, beginning on April 1, in spite of the worst ongoing power cuts to date. The National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) last week granted Eskom a 18.65% electricity tariff increase for the 2023/24 financial year and 12.74% for the 2024/2025 financial year, in a bid to recoup an allowable revenue of more than R318 billion and R352bn for both years, respectively. Nersa said its decision reconsidered capital-related costs for…

The Transvaal Agricultural Union (TLU SA) is calling on the government to exempt farmers from load shedding as the latest extended stages wreak havoc on farming operations, tipping food security to the edge of the precipice. In a statement before a meeting on the invitation of Agriculture Minister Thoko Didiza, where different parties will discuss the energy crisis, TLU SA said the government should consider agriculture as an essential service for the sake of food surety, where no load shedding was applied. It said cold chain farmers and farmers dependent on irrigation should be released from load shedding or load shedding should be applied to them out of peak times. “The government has to realise that the current energy crisis puts food security in question,” Bennie van Zyl, general…

Putting one or two new faces on Eskom’s board will not change the severe corruption at Eskom that has filtered down to project level at the utility and a task team needs to be sent in to clean the utility out, energy analyst Ted Blom said on Jacaranda FM online this weekend. Blom, a well known energy industry specialist and commentator, said his estimates were that more than R500 billion has been lost at Eskom due to corruption over the past decade. He said for instance, that in 2008, a crime syndicate in Eskom’s coal operations involving 54 people and a senior government minister “not far from the top” had syphoned off some R8 billion of Eskom in “emergency” spending where there had been no tender. He did not wish…

THE Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) has issued a massive GHS8.2 billion (about R13bn) assessment including a penalty and interest, on Scancom (MTN Ghana), which the telecoms group has “strongly” disputed. MTN Group – has 285 million subscribers in Africa and the Middle East – and said a third party review of the assessment did not support the GRA’s assessment. MTN Ghana is one of the biggest taxpayers in that country. MTN is not a stranger to hefty fines in Africa, having agreed in 2020 to pay a $53m (R890m) fine to Nigerian authorities who were reportedly unfairly shaking down foreign companies at the time because the country’s oil-reliant economy was ailing due to the falling oil price. MTN also received an initial fine of $5.2bn – later reduced to…

CES 2023, formerly known as the Consumer Electronics Show, was presented in Las Vegas from January 5 to 8, 2023 and is the world’s biggest and most influential technology event as well as the proving ground for breakthrough technologies. It is here that many of the big companies announced or launched their new products for 2023, although it seemed to be less than previous years due to high inflation, the economic downswing, less spending on non-necessities and supply chain constraints. More than 3 200 exhibiting companies (60% Fortune 500 companies), including 1 000 start-ups, featured the latest technologies and next era innovations. CES 2023 was attended by more than 115 000 industry professionals, of which over 40 000 were international attendees from 140 countries. Certain current…

TRANSNET and the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) have reached an agreement with Liebherr, the German-Swiss multinational heavy equipment-maker to pay R54 million for irregularities in the award of two tenders in 2013 and 2014. In a statement, state-owned Transnet said the two tenders were for supplying cranes to Transnet. Liebherr had supplied all the cranes under the contracts, which are in use and would continue to be used by Transnet Port Terminals, Transnet said. “The SIU found that the decision to award the tenders was irregular. Transnet, the SIU, and Liebherr accordingly agreed that the decision to award the tenders should be reviewed and set aside,” Transnet said. According to Transnet, investigations also found that Liebherr had paid $3.2m (about R54m) to Accurate Investments Limited, a sales agent appointed…