House Chairperson,
The ACDP understands that this Amendment Bill seeks amend the Eskom Debt Relief Act, No 7 of 2023, so as to provide for the reduction of the amount for the requirements for Eskom, for the 2025/26 financial year, and to treat the entire amount for that year as a loan convertible into equity upon meeting set conditions.
It is an open secret that Eskom has experienced a series of financial and operational challenges, caused to a larger extent by governance failures, poor leadership, corruption and malfeasance, poor management and high turnover of boards, CEOs and Executives. All these factors combined, affected the performance of the power utility. In 2019, the chickens came home to roost, and with a debt of R423 billion, Eskom could not honor its debt obligations, despite the allocation of R230 billion over a period of 10 years. The rationale for this bailout was that failure to meet its obligations could have had negative consequences for Eskom and the entire debt portfolio of government.
This Bill uses accounting gymnastics by raising the initial R40 billion to R80.23 billion for the 2025/26 fiscal year, with an additional R10 billion proposed for 2028/29, while the total provision amounts to R20 billion less than the initial R110.2 billion provisioned for in the 2023 Debt Relief Bill.
Eskom management has boldly expressed confidence in its recovery trajectory. Its financial performance in 2024/25 was boosted by a significant operational turnaround when compared to Dec’25 Q3 results, the ACDP is aware that the 16% increase in revenue to R264.6 billion, was mainly due to a 12.74% tariff increase. It must be recalled that Eskom failed to present its finances on time to the Auditor-General (AG), who lamented that had Eskom implemented its recommendations over the last five years, the exorbitant tariff increases would not be necessary.
Chairperson, with electricity fast becoming unaffordable, the ACDP called for Eskom to supply quarterly reports on compliance with the AG recommendations. Furthermore, we call for a moratorium on further bailouts until measurable operational improvements are achieved. The supports this Bill with many reservations.
