Overseas witnesses and 80m pieces of reading material: Former Eskom CEO Koko wants fraud case struck

Former Eskom CEO Matshela Koko and his co-accused have argued for the R2 billion corruption case against them to be struck from the roll because of delays.

Koko, his wife, Mosima, daughters Koketso Aren and Thato Choma, as well as local attorney Chris Coetzee, were among those who appeared in the Middelburg Specialised Commercial Crimes Court on Thursday.

At the centre of the case, is an alleged dodgy contract awarded by Eskom to Swiss-based engineering company Asia Brown Boveri (ABB) for the construction of Eskom’s Kusile Power Plant.

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The defence told the court delays had frustrated the case and asked it be taken off the court role and only reinstated on written instruction by the Attorney General. It argued the matter had been on record for almost a full year and should not be postponed further.

The state said it was ready to proceed with trial in the high court, once racketeering charges had been added, but asked for a further postponement of four months to get statements from overseas witnesses.

According to the Middleburg Observer, the defence argued extraditing accused and witnesses in the UK, Germany and the US could take up to three years and further delay proceedings, but the state said this was not crucial for the trial to go ahead.

It said the state was in possession of more than 80 million individual pieces of reading material, equalling more than 14 terabytes of data, related to the case.

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Judgment on the defence’s application to remove the case from the court roll is set to be handed down on 29 September 2023.

State Capture

Chief Justice Raymond Zondo, in his Judicial Commission of Inquiry into State Capture report, found Koko was central to the capture of Eskom. He recommended Koko be criminally investigated over several dodgy tenders.

Koko accused the commission of bias against him and filed a review application in the Gauteng High Court. He argued he always only had Eskom’s best interests at heart, and certain comments and findings in the report should be set aside.