The minister of Public Enterprises, Lynne Brown, announced the appointment of four new interim Eskom board members following the board’s annual general meeting (AGM) today (Friday).
At a media briefing immediately after the AGM she said that she could not operate with the current limited number of board members and that the board needed different committees – such as governance, audit and risk – in order to function correctly.
Pulane Molokwane and Batjonile Makhubela are both scientists with some environmental and green energy experience while Sathiaseelan Gounden is a chartered accountant who was part of the internal auditing team at the South African Revenue Service. Simphiwe Dingaan is an auditor with a strong project management background.
Commenting on whether the new appointees had been approved by Cabinet, she said that they had been passed by the deployment committee and the next step would be to take them through the Cabinet process. This, she added, would only take place at next month’s Cabinet meeting.
This announcement followed the appointment of Johnny Dladla as the new acting CEO of Eskom, three weeks after Brown announced the order to rescind Brian Molefe’s reappointment to the position.
The board said in a statement yesterday (Thursday) that this decision had come after what it called “intense” consultations with Brown “in order to arrive at a prudent choice”.
“Dladla is a seasoned business leader with impeccable credentials,” said acting Board chairman, Zethembe Khoza. “His business acumen, which includes his commendable knowledge of Eskom intricacies, will come in handy in his new role.”
Brown added that the decision to appoint Dladla as acting CEO would bring further stability to the company.
