Major revelation about André de Ruyter’s corruption allegations

[Nat Quinn]

Former Eskom CEO André de Ruyter’s privately funded investigation reports never made it into the hands of South African Police Service (SAPS) Brigadier Jap Burger, the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) heard on Wednesday.

On the face of it, Burger’s testimony contradicts De Ruyter’s statements that he provided the intelligence to the police to investigate corruption, fraud, and maladministration at Eskom.

Burger retired from the police in June 2023, and Scopa subpoenaed him to appear.

The committee sought to understand the extent of Burger’s knowledge of the allegations made by the former Eskom CEO and to disclose any action he took as a result.

However, Burger told Scopa that he never received the intelligence report De Ruyter had commissioned from George Fivaz Forensic and Risk (GFFR).

Instead, he said he received bits and pieces of unvalidated information he could do nothing with.

Burger told Scopa he passed the information he did have to the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation — the Hawks.

Scopa said it wanted to question Burger after national police commissioner Fannie Masemola disclosed that he (Burger) had met with De Ruyter in August 2022 to discuss his allegations.

The committee thanked Burger for his cooperation with the proceedings.

“It [Scopa] has now reached the end of its investigation and will meet in two weeks’ time to discuss the way forward and compile a report on its investigation,” it said.

De Ruyter first made his explosive allegations in an hour-long interview on E-tv’s My Guest Tonight with Annika Larsen in February 2023.

Although he had already resigned in December, with his last day scheduled for 31 March 2023, the Eskom board and De Ruyter “agreed” that he should leave the power utility with immediate effect.

The then-Eskom CEO alleged that senior politicians were involved in coal cartels and sabotaging power stations.

De Ruyter said there were signs of political interference limiting Eskom’s response to these threats.

“We know of at least four organised crime cartels operating in Mpumalanga in Eskom. Some of them also have interests in Transnet,” he said.

He added that people who attempted to act against these criminals were killed “pretty much every week”.

Coal syndicates have plagued the state-owned power utility for years.

De Ruyter said Eskom told one senior government minister that a high-level politician was involved in the coal cartels.

“The minister looked at a senior official and said, ‘I guess that it was inevitable that it would come out anyway’, which suggests that this wasn’t news,” he said.

De Ruyter later repeated his claims in his tell-all book about his tenure at the power utility — Truth to Power, My Three Years Inside Eskom — released in May 2023.

The former CEO appeared before Scopa via video link in April 2023, where he was asked to name the senior politicians he said were involved in corruption and sabotage at Eskom power stations.

However, he refused to name or otherwise identify the officials, essentially saying he felt his life would be in danger if he were to identify them.

“Ask Minister [Pravin] Gordhan and Dr [Sydney] Mufamadi because they were informed. They are aware,” said De Ruyter.

Pravin Gordhan, Minister of Public Enterprises

“As you know, I am not in a position where I have immunity [from legal action like defamation claims]. I, therefore, am unable to make any statement that could potentially put me at risk of any legal action, whether it be civil or criminal.”

Gordhan ripped into De Ruyter — someone he had once supported — following his interview and book.

“What Mr De Ruyter effectively said was that all of us in government are idiots and that stirred the backlash,” said Gordhan.

“He did not pay the attention to Eskom’s generation that he should have, and instead swanned around the world looking at renewables.”

De Ruyter’s private investigation conducted by George Fivaz Forensic and Risk came under fire earlier this year from independent analysts.

Journalist Jacques Pauw, reporting for News24, said the dossiers “contained no facts”, were “effectively worthless”, and were used as the basis for “wild and uncorroborated allegations”.

However, Daily Maverick reported that an expert legal opinion from former police superintendent and advocate Cerita Joubert came to the opposite conclusion as Pauw.

Fivaz commissioned Joubert’s report, and Daily Maverick said he selected her for obvious reasons — besides her experience as a police officer and advocate, she writes the textbooks for the South African police.

She was the editor and main author of all five editions of Applied Law for Police Officials.

“It is concluded that the intelligence reports compiled by GFFR [George Fivaz Forensic & Risk] constitute a critical first step and forceful springboard from which investigations into the undoubted criminalities at Eskom can and should be launched,” Joubert stated.

 

SOURCE:Major revelation about André de Ruyter’s corruption allegations (mybroadband.co.za)

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