KABELO KHUMALO | Mteto Nyati and the fight to keep the family silver

From the sheer genius of Hendrik Johannes van der Bijl, Eskom’s architect and its founding chair, to the resolute Mteto Nyati, the power producer has had its fair share of charismatic and consequential chairpersons, each facing different challenges.

For Van der Bijl, who borrowed R16m from the state to put his plans to build Eskom into action, the audacity of it all cemented his place among the legendary scientists to be born in South Africa.

Now, 103 years after the daring establishment of Eskom, Africa’s largest power producer by a mile, Nyati, its current chair, has taken a stand against the move to strip the company of its transmission assets — a move that pits him against the Presidency, which first announced Eskom’s unbundling into three divisions.

At the time, Nyati and CEO Dan Marokane were not within the ranks of Eskom. The unbundling of the power utility into three units — generation, distribution and transmission — is part of the biggest reform of the electricity sector since 1923, when Van der Bijl dared greatly.

Nyati has different dynamics to contend with: keeping the “family silver”.

He has spent the past month making public utterances on Eskom needing to keep the transmission assets, going as far as accusing big business of playing underhanded games to ensure Eskom loses control of them.

Nyati this week took to 702 radio, where he brought up the question of Eskom’s debt pile of R350bn, warning that faced with such a hefty liability, losing its existing transmission assets could affect its ability to continue to manage what it owes.

“That debt is underpinned by these assets. So we cannot just go about and do restructuring without the consent [of lenders],” he told Bongani Bingwa.

The Presidency was quick to call Nyati to order, saying it was unfortunate that he “creates an impression as if there is a process that’s under way without the inclusion of Eskom and to the detriment of Eskom”.

The divergent views over ownership of the transmission assets came to the fore in December 2025.

Eskom’s top brass went into the December holidays under the impression that the immediate future of the transmission assets was secured.

On December 9, the utility said in a statement that electricity & energy minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa had approved Eskom’s revised unbundling strategy.

“Under the revised unbundling strategy, transmission assets remain owned by the National Transmission Company South Africa (NTCSA), which operates as a subsidiary of Eskom Holdings and will continue to expand and maintain the national grid,” Eskom’s statement read.

That debt is underpinned by these assets. So we cannot just go about and do restructuring without the consent [of lenders].—  Mteto Nyati, Eskom chair

“Eskom’s approach enables a smooth and orderly transition to the future market structure by retaining NTCSA as the transmission asset owner within Eskom Holdings, while a separate and independent Transmission System Operator (TSO) SOC Ltd is established.”

Eskom and Ramokgopa got a rude awakening two months later when President Cyril Ramaphosa in February threw out the revised unbundling strategy, assuring the market that the 2019 plan remained intact.

Before that, business, under the banners of Business Leadership South Africa and Business Unity South Africa, wrote to Ramaphosa asking him to clarify where he stood on electricity reform.

Big business’s position is that without owning the grid assets, the TSO lacks the balance sheet capacity to raise financing for the R440bn transmission expansion needed to connect new renewable generation and support economic growth.

Ramaphosa established a National Treasury-led task team to map the way forward for Eskom’s unbundling.

The task team reported back to the president two weeks ago, urging the government to forge ahead with handing ownership of the transmission assets to the TSO. The Presidency has described the task team’s report as reflecting a “clear and unified vision” across government to establish an independent TSO, which will be separated from Eskom.

Mteto’s public utterances of his displeasure at the pace of the unbundling have raised questions about his future as Eskom’s chair. His term ends in October. It remains to be seen whether he will avail himself or be invited to serve on the board beyond then.

No matter the outcome, Nyati’s tenure at Eskom will go down as one of the most consequential in the utility’s recent memory — putting him in the ranks of pathfinders such as Van der Bijl.

Eskom is today increasingly a sustainable, investable company, ready to compete in a liberalised and competitive energy market — a stark contrast to the crisis the board inherited in October 2022.

The board has successfully navigated South Africa out of load-shedding, which brought the economy to a standstill, particularly in 2023 — the worst year of load-shedding on record.

Initially approached by Ramaphosa for the CEO role, Nyati has turned out to be an astute chair, with an eye for the technical talent needed to keep the lights on.

One of his first appointments was Bheki Nxumalo in April 2023 as head of generation, with the board giving him operational authority over power station managers, helping to steer the utility’s recent performance turnaround and reduction in power cuts.

The next major appointment was Marokane, who was crazy enough to accept what was at the time South Africa’s most unwanted job. He has gone on to form a formidable team with Nxumalo, significantly improving the utility’s energy availability factor and slashing spending on diesel to power the economy.