Eskom strengthens executive team with four appointments to prepare for a competitive marketplace

Thursday, 17 October 2024: Eskom Group Chief Executive (GCE) Dan Marokane has announced the first four of seven new executive appointments to further address the current business challenges and future-proof the organization through the delivery of strategic initiatives to enable growth and long-term sustainability.

Eskom is aligning its executive execution capability and capacity to focus its skilled people in the best structure where they can deliver value the fastest.

“Eskom recognized that it needed to bring in some new skills at the executive level to guide its teams in the business so it can execute strategic initiatives in a competitive market faster, more efficiently, and in areas which are new to the utility. In just five months, we have closed critical positions at Eskom. I have been impressed with the volume and calibre of applicants who were willing to be associated with our brand. Our new executives had a choice of who they could work for. They chose Eskom,” said the Eskom Group Chief Executive, Dan Marokane.

“We must now more than ever remain focused on delivery and changing the way we do things, not how we are structured, to the benefit of our customers who will increasingly have a choice of energy provider as the market reforms take place. It is our intention to remain a critical player in South Africa’s evolving future energy market, and we will move at pace to recover lost ground,” concluded Marokane.

The appointments effective from 1 November 2024 are as follows:

Group Executive: Corporate Services – Ms. Portia Mngomezulu
Portia is an accomplished corporate services executive with over 28 years of experience, including more than a decade in senior leadership roles within the public sector. She has demonstrated a strong ability to revitalize public entities and achieve financial stability, underscoring her commitment to compliance and governance. Portia will focus on streamlining controls and capacitating the unbundled entities, leading to an efficient corporate support service.

Group Executive: Strategy and Sustainability – Ms. Nontokozo Hadebe
Nontokozo is a seasoned strategy executive with 23 years of experience in strategy development, corporate planning, performance management, and strategic initiatives management. Her expertise lies in long-term organizational strategy development and implementation plans. She has successfully led and contributed to several transformational strategies and organizational development initiatives. Nontokozo will progress work in the areas of adapting our strategy and aligning our research and development focus to solve Eskom’s current and future sustainability challenges and options.

Group Executive: Group Capital – Mr. Roman Crookes
Roman brings over 23 years of experience in the power industry. Most recently, he successfully completed the construction and commissioning of the GNPD Power Plant, comprising two critical 725MW units, in the Philippines. Prior to this, he served as Project Director of the Medupi Power Plant Project, where he oversaw the overall project management up to the first unit being online. Roman will refocus the business on driving efficiency in capital projects execution and capacitating the unbundled entities appropriately.

Chief Information and Technology Officer – Mr. Len de Villiers
Len is appointed on a three-year contract. He has over 40 years of experience in the Information Technology industry and is considered one of the top Chief Information Officers in South Africa. He has extensive experience in the financial services industry and complex technology change projects and is expected to assist our business in embracing the pace of digitalization, the use of artificial intelligence, and increased levels in areas of cybersecurity.

Delivering on the Strategic Initiatives

In June, Eskom announced that over the next 36 months, it will pursue its strategy across a number of key initiatives to deliver value. These include:
• Increasing the Energy Availability Factor (EAF) to 70% in the next 12 to 36 months.
• Returning more than 2.5GW in capacity to the grid by March 2025 and developing an executable initial pipeline of at least 2GW of clean energy projects by 2026.
• Re-baselining the cost trajectory and improving efficiencies.
• Advocating and pursuing a sustainable solution for municipality debt.
• Delivering the unbundling of the Distribution and Generation divisions.
• Accelerating the implementation of initiatives to enable a Just Energy Transition.

Eskom will continue to focus on implementing its generation recovery plan, strengthening governance, and tackling crime and corruption, while future-proofing the organization to enable energy security, growth, and long-term sustainability to the benefit of South Africa and sub-Saharan Africa.

ENDS