Eskom officials ‘fooled the system’ to pay R659m upfront for Gupta coal

Eskom’s primary energy division was given only an hour and a half to push through a controversial half-a-billion rand payment to the Guptas on April 13 2016, Snehal Nagar, who oversees finances in the division said. Appearing before Judge Raymond Zondo at the state capture inquiry on Tuesday‚ Nagar described how Eskom deviated from standard procedure to make the prepayment for coal.

The next day‚ he received a call from Maya Bhana-Naidoo who was a general manager in the office of then CFO Anoj Singh. Bhana-Naidoo said the payment needed to made by 2pm that day. “Everyone needed to be on board to effect this payment and Bhana-Naidoo said she would chat to everyone to make sure they were on board‚” he said.

He said the system had to be “fooled” in order to create and settle an order as if the utility had received the coal.“What the team did was they amended a purchase order of the Brakfontein contract to reflect an order of R659m. The payment to Tegeta was effected on the Brakfontein contract‚” Nagar said.

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