KEY POINTS
- Eskom chairman Mteto Nyati said Andre de Ruyter’s management team was disconnected from employees and operations on the ground.
- The board visited power stations and engaged workers directly to understand the causes of Eskom’s crisis and persistent load shedding.
- After De Ruyter’s departure, the board appointed Dan Marokane, who Nyati said was suited to both fixing Eskom’s immediate problems and leading it into a more competitive energy market.
Eskom’s former chief executive, Andre de Ruyter, has come under renewed scrutiny after the utility’s chairman, Mteto Nyati, said the executive management team was disconnected from the realities facing employees and operations on the ground.
Nyati made the disclosure during a discussion on Eskom’s turnaround at the Unisa Graduate School of Business Leadership, where he reflected on the challenges faced by the power utility when the current board took office.
According to Nyati, Eskom was in the middle of a severe crisis at the time, characterised by persistent load shedding, financial losses and growing operational difficulties.
The board, he said, decided that it could not rely solely on reports from senior management to understand the problems confronting the organisation.
Instead, it embarked on extensive engagements with employees and visited power stations across the country to gain a clearer picture of what was happening within the utility.
Board Discovered a Disconnect Within Eskom
Nyati said the board’s direct engagement with employees produced an important finding: Eskom’s top management, led by De Ruyter at the time, was not sufficiently connected to the wider organisation.
The chairman said the board deliberately chose to listen to employees at different levels rather than simply accepting information supplied by the executive management team.
He explained that travelling to power stations and speaking directly with workers revealed perspectives that had previously not been adequately considered in Eskom’s decision-making process.
According to Nyati, employees working at operational sites had a clear understanding of some of the measures they believed were necessary to address the utility’s problems.
He suggested that those insights would not have emerged if the board had limited its engagement to meetings with senior executives.
The experience, he said, demonstrated the importance of ensuring that Eskom’s leadership remains closely connected to employees and operational realities.
When Nyati and the latest board assumed responsibility, Eskom was already under intense pressure.
The utility was struggling to provide reliable electricity to South Africans, while its financial position was deteriorating. Regular load shedding had become a major national concern, affecting households, businesses and economic activity.
Nyati said the board recognised the seriousness of the situation and decided to first understand the underlying causes before developing measures to address them.
