UPDATE: Eskom’s recovers 22 000 litres of R500 000 worth of stolen diesel

Police spokesperson, Zinzi Hani has confirmed that police have managed to recover 22 00 litres of the R500 000 worth of diesel that was stolen from Eskom.

“Through investigations, police managed to track down the whereabouts of 22 000 litres of the fuel that was stolen. The stolen full has been repumped back to Eskom,” she said.

Eskom says it will not be able to replace the R500 000 worth of diesel that was allegedly stolen by a 40-year-old plant operator for Eskom in the Western Cape, citing that it has exceeded its budget.

The parastatal said that it would only be placing an order from more diesel from April 2023.

Police confirmed that the R500 00 worth of diesel that went missing has not yet been traced, nor any money relating to the alleged sale of it.

Meanwhile, the employee who stands accused has been granted R50 000 bail after he was arrested for allegedly stealing R500 000 worth of diesel from the country’s strained power supplier.

Eskom – which has been crippled by woes relating to diesel shortages and failing infrastructure amongst other issues – said it was dealt a further blow when it found that half a million rand worth of diesel was missing from its supplies about a month ago. The issue was reported to the police.

One of its plant operators, known as Angelo Cysman, was implicated in the alleged siphoning of the fuel.

Accused allegedly declared diesel tanker empty

According to police reports,  internal investigations established that the plant operator allegedly permitted a vehicle to collect the stolen diesel from the site in leeway he declared the diesel tanker empty and that all diesel has been offloaded. Police reports confirm, however, that it was not.

Cysman was then arrested just before Christmas, on Friday 23 December 2022, whilst at home during his suspension.

Internal investigation was also conducted by Eskom and the Hawks’ Crimes Against the State team based in Bellville.

Cysman – who was employed by Eskom in Atlantis briefly appeared at the Atlantis Magistrate Court on 28 December 2022.

The matter has been postponed to the 24th February 2023 for further investigation.

Spokesperson for the SAPS, Zinzi Hani said that the R500 000 worth of diesel was not recovered as yet nor was any amount of money that might have come from the alleged sale of it.

Eskom can’t buy more diesel due to exceeded budgets

Eskom this past November said that it did not plan to order any more diesel until 1 April 2023, after exceeding its R11 billion diesel budget by about R1 billion.

This means that for the next few months, it will struggle to afford to run its diesel-powered emergency generation fleet through Open Cycle Gas Turbine power stations.

Meanwhile, the power giant has confirmed that the country will remain on Stage 4 load shedding till the New Year.

Eskom confirmed yesterday (28 December 2022) that this was due to the breakdown of four generating units and delays in returning some units to service.