'Eskom does not have a money problem' - Moeletsi Mbeki

China has donated R170m in emergency power equipment to alleviate South Africa's energy crisis. Political analyst Moeletsi Mbeki tells Duduzile Ramela that Eskom does not have a money problem, but a management problem.
Tune into Newzroom Afrika DStv channel 405 for more.

[@Obitseng]

I agree with mr Mbeki the problem at Eskom is lack of management skills, greedy and corruption

[@davidjames1007]

So now we blame the apartheid again.....the ANC messed up 100% and that is it

[@carolinejeanallincarolj]

Anc fucked up 100% with the help of Eskom

[@shaneboke7216]

Apartheid has a legacy though but we should be taking responsibility of current affairs and that includes apartheid beneficiaries.

[@ondelamatshoba5996]

Who blamed apartheid? did you even listen to the video ?

[@marabunya]

I was speaking with a friend the other day about how the systematic outsourcing of technical skills to private service providers and cadres leads to a gradual decline of the the skills pool in the public sector and this is done deliberately so that some people can bleed state coffers and eat with their friends. Any government with common sense would invest in building a highly skilled work force that can compete with and even outperform the private sector. We can't even locate one decent government inspector who knows where to start assessing the quality of work done by a contractor.

[@janetgroenewald222]

Cyril and comrades dont have loadshedding....??????

[@riagoosen4489]

No they enjoy lights throughout all their properties, that are equipped with 🔀 paid by the tax payers! 😅

[@charlescheary8996]

Political appointments has failed South Africa

[@nunezdarwin9938]

Finally someone speaking the truth about black people and ANC

[@thulisagrootboom2346]

What's that truth?

[@chronosmagasaurus2813]

@@thulisagrootboom2346 The truth that those racist policies failed

[@JohnDaviesisahumanbrowneye]

i dont see how apartheid figures into this. if it was the case , the ANC had 30 years which is 16 years shy of how long apartheid lasted to learn how the systems that were put in place with eskom when the infrastructure was built worked but didnt. this is like a friend giving me his phone but not the manual and me calling it a poisoned chalice because i cant figure out how to make a call on it. you get your friend to show you how it works. but i dont think that is the case; i think this is another lazy attempt to shift blame to apartheid and play victim instead of own up for the ANC's poor running of the country. because as the man said loadshedding is 17 years old, not 30, so for almost the first half of the new regime someone under the ANC run government knew how to work things just fine until the money to keep the thing maintained and upgraded started going to the leadership's coffers and "fire pools" instead. its been 3 decades already, how many decades removed from apartheid do you expect the world and even your own people to buy that all their failings are because of a racist afrikaans regime instead of your peoples inability to get their shit together and start thinking of the people instead of themselves?

[@jacquesdewet2661]

HAHAHA.. the ANC steals more money than that every month from Eskom!

[@firstcomment749]

Cartels steal R1bill p mnth!! 4 of them identified, named + 2 ministers who looted + sabotaged for how many yrs? There's even a organigrams of this thieving enterprise the size of a boardroom table available - 10 months later, with not 1 of them arrested + LS getting worse. Another loan added later + tax payers + consumers sits with billions thieved to pay back

[@sagesse9551]

Five hundred million grant, just another feeding trough, let's see how quickly this money is chowed!

[@Sq7Arno]

It's tiny in any case. Miniscule. This tiny bit of aid and a tiny loan is being celebrated while the $8billion assistance that came from Western countries was criticized. Why? Simple idiocy for one. And of course China Inc doesn't care what the ANC does with the money - All they're interested in is repossessing parts of our country when the repayment fails.

[@kambrose1549]

The problem started with his brother who refused to take the advice to build more power stations when he was president

[@NomakweziNdiweni]

Akahlangene nalokho haw kodwa yini

[@riagoosen4489]

Agree 👍

[@xolanimsipa7656]

He said problem started 17yrs ago,that would be 2006 and his brother was a president,listen attentively.

[@trevorerasmus1605]

Mr Mbeki, please don't lose all your credibility by making excuses for the governments failures. The systems used by Eskom when ran under NP rule was not apartheid systems. They were working business minded systems and your government's inability and incompetence together with petulance and spitefulness has eroded systems that could have continued working to this day if the actual work was done. They of course thought stuff runs itself which they found out the hard way is not how it works and now all SA citizens are paying the price for their stupidity.

[@khaya7272]

The NP minority govt serviced only a minority of the population, you can’t compare that to the responsibility that the ANC government has faced, having to electrify every home in the country. Everyone can claim to be doing well when the scope of work is for 3m instead of 60m.

[@frankcogallo]

Mr Mbeki, your brother Thabo and the ANC is a very big reason for the downfall of ESKOM and he admitted himself.

[@truth-Hurts375]

Stop talking Rubbish...Under Apartheid EKSDOM served only a small portion of the population...Mainly White Domkoppe like you !!!!

[@thembanimgenu190]

​@@khaya7272anc and responsibility? That electricity is buyer per user principle.

[@sengamemela3720]

@Erasmus apartheid regime only looked after 5 million people while robbing 50 000million black south africans..2. The apartheid government owned all the coal mines...now coal mines are owned privately and eskom buys poor coal from mines owned by white people at a dollar rate...Everyone knows that in 1994 the government took over a state with no money...all state monies and assets were transferred to private people...the question is whose private hands???

[@grantevans6597]

I normally appreciate Moeletsi Mbeki, but today he is talking rubbish. Eskom's problems stem from incompetence and corruption, all under the umbrella of the ANC.

[@entabeni1337]

What works in competent hands doesnt work in incompetent hands

[@Kyle-mi5vn]

agree... eskom has a stealing problem 😅

[@lebohangmoloi6229]

We like it or not Brian and Koko remain the stars of this eskom and should be brought back

[@aarongunnz9513]

Thieves

[@davidblyth5495]

Factual error! Escom was established prior to the Nats' apartheid regime. It was the vision of Gen Smuts that led to Escom, Iscor, CSIR and other institutions which became the foundation of SA's industrial capabilities. The Nats only inherited it as did the ANC. The difference is the former managed it effectively while the latter plundered. Engineering systems are not "apartheid" systems. Either one respects the laws of nature and economics or one fails. Generally Moletsi Mbeki is good but here he's quite off base.

[@JohnDaviesisahumanbrowneye]

its about the MISMANAGEMENT of the money.

[@riagoosen4489]

Absolutely 💯

[@janetgroenewald222]

Too much corruption

[@christinemeyer7163]

Mr Moeketsi, I respected your balanced insights over a period of time---just PLEASE leave apartheid in the past. The anc inherit a fully workable system providing electricity to all of SA as well as neighbouring countries--it should flourish in the democracy!!!! It was people that couldn't manage it,and your brother was one who started the down slide

[@bleh4352]

This is a genuine question, because I am super young. So I am hoping to get an answer and not to be attacked. But did Eskom really provide power for everyone? Because i remember quite recently(2005-2009) the country was still trying to get power units to some unwhite areas. Again this is a genuine question.

[@tshepolaka8132]

I don't agree with Mr Moeletsi Mbheki on this one. He is normally sound but this time he is wrong. We have turned our politics and economics to the private sector 300 years ago. Eskom has suppliers who are in the private sector and some of these people are not happy just to supply goods and services to Eskom but they want to own it. My belief is that somehow our politicians and some businessman have decided that they would devalue Eskom by destroying it so that they can buy it for R1 just like they are trying to do with SAA . The aim has never been to fix it but to sell it to their business partners and friends. We can't as a country privatize our means of energy production, Eskom is strategic for the country and we cannot afford to give it to foreign interests working through multinationals. Imagine what would have happened to Rassia if they privatize their strategic assets, when they were sanctioned those companies they depend on would have left and plunged Rassia into a crisis. Rassia is able to stand and mitigate western sanctions because it is to a certain extent self sufficient. Privatization erodes self sufficiency and thus threaten national Sovereignty and makes you a slave to foreign agents mascarading as businessman

[@MoeresietAhjum]

They only have a little money to steal they need more 😂😂😂😂

[@squareboxable]

Advisors did not advise

[@neermalapillay8016]

True management

[@gertsteenkamp6970]

Corporation and steal money

[@kambrose1549]

Hst nonsense he speaks

[@DebraPaige-ty3vr]

Yeah, eskom does not have a money problem they have no money. That is the problem.

[@mohamedmia6593]

Looting carnival

[@priscillalatchmiah7939]

Ask😅 Indians to manage Eskom. They are very intelligent.

[@janetgroenewald222]

Matter of money always power ....

[@hennieboshoff8109]

Why ask Chine we have the skills in SA but due to this Anc cadre employment the got put aside now in a country with high unemployment you want Chinese to get the work why not use the skills we got just forget your racist excuses and get this fixed this has nothing to do with China.

[@mabaker391]

No, I guesz Eskom doesn't have a cash problem - as long as the African National Cleptomanic party can leave the cookiejar alone but - chances are they won't!!!!

[@IanGrahamThomas]

We need to look after the elections and see if anything has happened. All about election hunting, if it works all well and good.

[@thisiscolbert3007]

Sound guy on leave.

[@Sq7Arno]

More Zuma taxes. There were plans to privatize Eskom, but Zuma (or his power brokers, whoever they may be) didn't want it - And we all know why he wanted to keep Eskom a state owned company. We're still paying for it. It's worth noting that in the past it wasn't at all unusual for Electricity companies to be state owned at all. Not here. Not anywhere. The ANC's main failure in this regard is to ignore the signs when it became better for countries to privatize their big state owned companies - But then... The ANC is by and large run by old fossils themselves. Who were trained not to run a country, but take over a country.

[@truth-Hurts375]

Go and look what people pay for electricity where it is supplied by Private companies....you lost your facking brains....

[@sengamemela3720]

The apartheid state owned all primary means of production, there were no private hospitals, all people used state owned enterprises...the state was never exposed...apartheid was funded by evil money...democracy is funded by both apartheid money and corrupt money...both these systems were imposed on the black people of this country who are a majority...

[@mzamosibeko6624]

Name one country that privatised a national power producer and didn't live to regret it I'll wait...

[@Sq7Arno]

@@mzamosibeko6624 How about the UK? Privatized in the 90s. Almost 40 electricity companies. In 1996 the average annual electricity bill was around 450 pounds. 2021 it was around 550 pounds. Little more than 20% increase over more than 25 years. Over that same timeframe SA electricity prices increased more than tenfold. I repeat in case you miss that last bit... TENFOLD - That's more than ten times what it was in the 90s in South Africa. And then of course in the UK, power outages are the exception, not the several times daily norm as they are here. Of course in 2022 UK prices spiked due to gas problems, but in the meantime gas prices have started lowering again. And the spike wasn't even that drastic.

[@mikestone8461]

Yes of course, the problem is that the apartheid system made a bad management system for Eskom and it took the Africans 30 years and 17 years of loadshedding to finally find the cause, which is of course apartheid....when will these people take responsibility for their failed government.

[@elizabethandrsu369]

Appartheid and democratic are two different things .17yrs Loadshedding is not a child's play.If they wanted to do something against should have done long time.Thank you China that you are helping our country and try to take the poverty away. I always believe ,* there is nothing for nothing*.

[@priscillalatchmiah7939]

Find intelligent people to run Eskom. Not cadres.

[@squareboxable]

Rubbish!! anc mismanaged…. Take responsibility!!!

[@psylentrage]

R170 million rand is enough to add a 5KW solar setup (using solar as an example here) to a mere 1000-1500 homes, making it a paltry 5-7.5 MW, considering an entire phase needs 1000MW. I think the private sector has added more, just in any one of the metropols, on their OWN homes.

[@truth-Hurts375]

Stop trying to sound clever...On What Grid are you going to connect your face solar panals????

[@sengamemela3720]

Pipe dream...countries in Europe have solar energy but still buying our coal as base load...why?

[@psylentrage]

@@truth-Hurts375 Troll, if you read without commenting first, you would see

[@psylentrage]

@@sengamemela3720 Chest pains? Read my comment again

[@neermalapillay8016]

Moleseti beki does speak for good for s a

[@neermalapillay8016]

Anc made them rich politicians

[@thesonutube]

Embarrassingly poor analysis by Moeletsi. While Sasol was effectively created and developed off the back of public funding, the privatisation of Sasol has not benefitted the South African public in any commensurate way. The collapse of public entities and parastatals is effectively due to the elites allowing, enabling, benfitting from the corruption and mismanagement in these institutions with the ultimate aim of privatisation followed by monopolistic industry price gouging further exploiting the South African public and enriching corporates and their elite owners and compradors.

[@wannabeegonnabee2593]

🤣🤣🤣

[@rrekomane9631]

this one will be an expert on things he is not a part of. Instant expert this one

[@Russell2538]

Still be blaming apartheid in100 years time

[@riagoosen4489]

😂😂😂

[@JohnDaviesisahumanbrowneye]

way i figure it theyre running out of time with the apartheid blame. in 16 years we will have been free of apartheid as long as the system lasted. it also means there will have been about 2 under their leadership in which they had to get their shit together. Japan recovered from an atomic bomb drop on two of their major cities in terms of their social trauma and strengthened as an economic powerhouse in less time than that. even less put together countries like Vietnam had a famous war fought in their country that ended in 1975 and was a major tourist hotspot by the early 2000s. the GREAT DEPRESSION only lasted 10 years. so they might/probably will use apartheid as a means to blame shift after that time, but its going to sound progressively more and more ridiculous, and is going to be met with more and more skepticism the further we're removed from that time period. 😂

[@GlenroseMakgorogo]

You can ask that again

[@kenchucky2997]

But eskom has had like 20 bailouts from the ANC... the last one was 500 million no?

[@Ginger4789]

Find the money hilarious 😂😂😂

[@sweetnesssweetness5494]

Trevor Erasmus.....agree 100% with your comment....could not have put it better....stupid excuses....and they believe their own lies!!