- Eskom wishes to provide clarity on the news article published by City Press on Sunday, 17 September 2023 with the heading Eskom acting CEO’s role under scrutiny in R500m Fidelity contract.
It would have been prudent for the publication to substantiate their report or at least cite a source and to seek a comment from Eskom on the claims that the Eskom Board is turning its attention to Acting Group Chief Executive, Calib Cassim regarding the emergency security contract that was awarded to the Fidelity Services Group. Eskom can confirm that there is no investigation against the Acting Group Chief Executive.
Eskom would also like to reassure South Africans that the placement of the Fidelity Services security contract was in line with Eskom’s Procurement Procedure and the National Treasury directives for emergency procurement of services as previously communicated. The process followed for the approval of releasing the funds for emergency procurement was in line with delegation or policies in the Company.
Eskom finds the article by City Press to be misinformative and cautions against any action to divert its attention from dealing with the pressing issues, chief among those being loadshedding.
Eskom’s acting head of security, Karen Pillay, was placed on precautionary suspension at the end of June over her role in the contract. The matter allegedly relates to a R500 million emergency security contract awarded to Fidelity Services without going to tender. At the time, South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, deloyed 880 national defence force members to safeguard power stations around the country. Read more
Eskom’s acting head of security Karen Pillay. Image credit – LinkedIn
Eskom explains that the placement of the security contract was necessitated by information received by management indicating that there was a potential serious security risk to Eskom’s operations and assets. The contract was established from the period July 2022 to September 2022 with an estimated budget of R500 million. It was placed under emergency procurement to avert potential threats and to safeguard critical sites at Eskom. The scope of the contract mainly focused on the critical power stations, strategic corporate sites as well the Transmission network.
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Prior to placement of the contract, Eskom assessed the quotation from the supplier in responding to Eskom’s request and was satisfied on proceeding with their offering including the prices quoted. Operationally, across Eskom sites there was daily and monthly monitoring of activities and the payment of the invoices over the 3 months were in line with the contracted services. A total of approximately R250 million including VAT was spent for the duration of the contract.
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
