Business and Technology

Eskom to investigate CEO racism allegations

The Eskom board will investigate allegations made against CEO Andre De Ruyter, the company announced in a statement on 9 March. In light of the allegation of racism that has been made in the public domain against Group Chief Executive (GCE) André de Ruyter, the Eskom Board of Directors has resolved to initiate an investigation in order to establish the veracity and the basis to the allegation,” Eskom said.

“The allegation not only brings Eskom into disrepute, but it also threatens to detract and distract the focus of the Executive Team and the GCE in particular from their critical job of restoring Eskom to operational and financial sustainability. Eskom said the board will appoint an independent Senior Counsel to conduct the investigation.

This appointee will be empowered to interview any person that may be of assistance in the probe, and consider any evidence, and will then report back to the board and make a recommendation.

André de Ruyter

“The Board unanimously and unequivocally stands against racism and sexism, and for transformation and employment equity,” Eskom said.

“Simultaneously, however, the Board has instructed the executive to promote a high-performance culture to enable the critically important turnaround at Eskom to be delivered as soon as possible.”

Eskom said it is aware of, and grateful to the majority of Eskom employees who work hard in fulfilling their duties, which are of national importance in providing reliable and affordable electricity to South Africa. The Board is committed to transparency and will provide updates at critical stages of the investigation,” Eskom said.

Racism allegations
This statement from Eskom follows an announcement from Parliament’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) that it would investigate a complaint against De Ruyter accusing him of being racist.

The complaint was laid by suspended chief procurement officer Solly Tshitangano, who sent a letter to Minister of Public Enterprises Pravin Gordhan detailing his issue with De Ruyter.

Tshitangano accused de Ruyter of removing suppliers owned by black South Africans without following proper procedures while affording extra leniency to suppliers with white owners.

When this issue was raised during Eskom’s interaction with the parliamentary committee, chairperson Prof Malegapuru Makgoba said the reasons for the sending of this letter to Gordhan “arose when the Chief Executive Officer confronted Mr Tshitangano about his performance”.

In the same session, Gordhan sympathised with the difficulty of getting management to perform.

One of the difficult jobs of any CEO and perhaps even a board is to ensure that managers firstly, that report to him directly, secondly managers at a third or fourth level, perform according to their brief and their role definition,” Gordhan said.

“At this stage, I think it’s important that none of what anybody is saying means that aspersions are being cast on the integrity of the board or the CEO at this time.

SCOPA said it would investigate the complaint, however, and Eskom has now also launched an independent investigation into the matter, adding that it would comply fully with any investigation into the racism allegations by SCOPA.

In other news – Pic of the Queen Actor Shaka Khoza’s B#tt-N@ked Breaks The Internet

The Queen actor is a happily engaged man to his fiancé Mandy Hlongwane.

Shaka Khoza

This engagement comes a few months after he was involved in a scandal which involved a night of alcohol, nudity and potential s.e.x between he and friends, along with a few women. Learn more

Source: mybroadband