Who is Eskom’s Karen Pillay and why was she suspended?

After allegations of orchestrating an irregular tender surfaced, acting head of security at Eskom, Advocate Karen Pillay, has been placed on precautionary suspension.

Pillay is accused of not following proper processes when awarding Fidelity Security Services an unchallenged security contract.

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Eskom stated that it was relooking at the evidence presented around the allegations against Pillay.

The allegations

Pillay, in her capacity as head of security at Eskom, is accused of using the security report, compiled by former police chief George Fivaz – at the request of former CEO Andre de Ruyter – to award the contract to Fidelity without a competitive tender process.

In situations of emergency, government departments or state-owned enterprises have the authority to bypass the traditional competitive bidding process and directly engage a single supplier.

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Initially, Eskom justified the selection of Fidelity by citing management’s receipt of information regarding a potentially severe security risk to the company’s operations and assets.

While the initial contract value was stated as R500 million, Eskom later clarified that it ultimately paid only R250 million for the services rendered.

Scopa

The decision to suspend Pillay came after Eskom executives faced scrutiny from the Parliament’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) regarding the Fidelity contract on Tuesday.

Scopa questioned Eskom’s chief procurement officer, Jainthree Sankar, about the process behind the tender and her decision to approve an emergency contract.

Sankar explained that she was not present in the initial meeting with De Ruyter and former Eskom COO Jan Oberholzer where the extent of the threat to Eskom was determined. She also stated that she did not play a role in selecting the service provider.

Sankar said she merely received instructions from her superiors, who motivated for an emergency response, specifying that Fidelity would be the chosen provider.

But Sankar said with the number of complaints they have since received regarding the process of how the tender was granted from third parties, they have decided to start investigations.

It is for this reason Pillay has been placed on precautionary suspension.

Pillay’s background

The former police officer, who hails from KwaZulu-Natal, was hired by Eskom in 2004 in security management for the power utility’s corporate division.

According to her professional LinkedIn profile, Pillay started her career in security at the South African Police Services in 1990 (after completing a bachelor’s degree in from Unisa) where she spent almost 10 years.

As a qualified advocate, she also worked as a special investigator after joining the Directorate of Special Operations in 2001.

She then went on to fulfill the role of team leader at the Special Investigating Unit (SIU), before joining Eskom in 2004.