{"id":609168,"date":"2022-07-20T14:51:25","date_gmt":"2022-07-20T12:51:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=609168"},"modified":"2022-07-20T15:10:12","modified_gmt":"2022-07-20T13:10:12","slug":"government-has-sent-a-letter-asking-for-help-at-eskom-heres-what-is-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/609168\/government-has-sent-a-letter-asking-for-help-at-eskom-heres-what-is-says\/","title":{"rendered":"Government has sent a letter asking for help at Eskom &#8211; here&#8217;s what is says"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan has sent a letter to trade union Solidarity, asking for its assistance in addressing the skills shortfall at Eskom.<\/p>\n<p>The letter, which is addressed to Solidarity&#8217;s chief executive Dirk Hermann, thanks the union for its offer of assistance and asks if Solidarity can compile a list of engineers and technical experts to assist.<\/p>\n<p>Gordhan added that specific skills that Eskom is looking for include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Power station engineers (mechanical, electrical, nuclear, system, and maintenance);<\/li>\n<li>Senior artisans;<\/li>\n<li>Plant operators (coal and nuclear).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In response, Hermann said the union has the<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SolidariDirk\/status\/1549391776066199554\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> names of hundreds of experts<\/a> <\/strong>who &#8216;have raised their hand to help&#8217;, and that the group is prepared to assist Eskom and the government if they are really ready to receive help.<\/p>\n<p>The letter sent by Gordhan to Solidarity is published in full below.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Solidarity-2.pdf\" width=\"100%\" height=\"600\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Eskom&#8217;s skill crisis<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In May 2020, a group of retired engineers comprising former Eskom employees offered to help fix the problems at the power utility for free. Eskom said it would consider the CVs individually and welcomed those with specialist skills to help without compensation.<\/p>\n<p>However, these offers of assistance were historically turned down by Eskom, with critics noting they did not meet the power utility&#8217;s transformation criteria and\/or were past retirement age.<\/p>\n<p>This was all but confirmed by chief executive Andr\u00e9 de Ruyter in response to <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/energy\/433234-eskom-cant-bring-back-the-skills-to-stop-load-shedding-heres-why.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">MyBroadband<\/a> <\/strong>questions in May.<\/p>\n<p>The Eskom boss said the power utility can\u2019t simply accept the offers of 70 skilled pensioners to return to the power utility and work for free. He added that the power utility must consider transformation, liability, and accountability in navigating the offers from these retirees.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Solidarity-1.pdf\" width=\"100%\" height=\"600\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>President Cyril Ramaphosa is set to announce a package of reforms to address the country\u2019s ongoing load shedding and power crisis in the coming days.<\/p>\n<p>Addressing the inaugural Black Industrialists and Exporters Conference in Sandton on Wednesday (20 July), the president said the country\u2019s black industrialists, like every other actor in the economy, can simply not grow without a reliable supply of affordable energy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat is why I have brought together all relevant departments and entities to work on an integrated set of measures to add additional power to the grid in the shortest possible time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are currently engaged in consultations with social partners on these measures and will soon be able to announce a package of measures that provides an effective response to our energy crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ramaphosa also committed to reforms in a number of other areas to assist the business sector \u2013 including the country\u2019s deteriorating infrastructure and transport network.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe should be discussing the steps we have taken \u2013 and still need to take \u2013 to significantly improve the state of our ports, rail lines and roads. We need to discuss the far-reaching reforms we are taking in telecommunications, energy and water to improve the competitiveness of our economy and reduce the cost of doing business.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese reforms are all necessary if we are to create conditions that enable black industrialists to emerge, grow and flourish. In particular, we need to act decisively and urgently to end the load shedding that is causing such damage to our economy and such disruption to our society.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/energy\/609078\/ramaphosa-to-announce-load-shedding-package-for-south-africa\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Ramaphosa to announce load shedding \u2018package\u2019 for South Africa<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan has sent a letter to trade union Solidarity, asking for its assistance in addressing the skills shortfall at Eskom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":462054,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[26,1632],"class_list":["post-609168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-headline","tag-solidarity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=609168"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609168\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":609210,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609168\/revisions\/609210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/462054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=609168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=609168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=609168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}