Former Eskom CEO Brian Dames Speaks

      

Former Eskom chief executive Brian Dames told Parliament’s state capture inquiry while the process is a great move, it is too late.

“You are too late,” he said. “You should have done this a long time ago.”

Dames said they should have been a lot more concerned when he left Eskom in 2014. He said when the exodus of senior executives left after his departure; they should have been a lot more concerned.

He said governance does not just work on structures; it has to do with leadership. "This is hugely important in companies and sets culture,” he said.

“I was fortunate to have a strong team at different levels. After the load shedding (in 2008), we asked what they (Eskom’s employees) wanted. They told us to deal with their personal safety, stop load shedding and restore our confidence in the leadership of the company.”

He said the recent changes at Eskom are shocking. Dames had a 27 year career at Eskom, where he started his career as a nuclear physicist at Koeberg nuclear power plant and worked his way from heading up coal power stations to becoming chief executive.

“I was a member of the executive from 2004,” he said. “In the middle of load shedding in 2008, I was approached to become chief operating officer. I was tasked to stop the load shedding, and that we did. It stopped in April 2008. Just before the World Cup in 2010, I was asked to be CEO. I left in March 2014.” 

Day two of the Portfolio Committee on Public Enterprises’ state capture inquiry will continue on Wednesday.

“The committee will be briefed by the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) and one important witness on the mismanagement of state funds into State Owned Enterprises (SOE),” the committee said in a statement.

That witness is former Eskom chief executive Brian Dames, who has been spotted in Parliament Old Assembly Chamber, where the inquiry is about to begin. Dames was appointed as CEO in July 2010 and stepped down in March 2014.

“What role did Eskom chief executives Maroga, Dames, Matona, and Molefe, acting chief executives Matjila and Koko, and Chief Financial Officers T. Molefe and Singh, as well as key executives in power generation, primary energy and commercial (procurement), play in major procurement processes where there have been allegations of corruption,” asks Professor Anton Eberhard in his Eskom Inquiry reference book, published as a tool for the inquiry.

In his presentation of the book on Tuesday, Eberhard said Dames  was treated appallingly by then Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba and then Eskom chairperson Zola Tsotsi. “Brian Dames held meddlers and the Guptas at bay,” said Eberhard.

In his book, Eberhard writes: “Eskom’s largest procurement line item is coal, purchasing around 120 million tonnes per annum, worth more than R50bn. It is here that we have seen the most ambitious schemes by the Gupta family to land lucrative contracts - in part made possible by the lack of transparency in coal procurement.

“When the Gupta family first met Eskom CEO Brian Dames in early 2010, they tried to obtain a coal supply contract to the Lethabo power station, but nothing was concluded as Lethabo was supplied through a secure, long-term contract at competitive prices by the New Vaal mine.”