The DA believes that the latest Eskom expose could be one of the reasons why its board has been reluctant to release the Dentons report.

The party was reacting to a Sunday Times article that alleges Eskom CEO Matshela Koko’s stepdaughter, Koketso Choma, 26, scored contracts worth R1 billion for her company from the parastatal.

DA MP Natasha Mazzone said the party would be writing to Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane, requesting that she launch an investigation into Koko.

“Koko’s reported actions could show that he is compromised and unfit to be the head of Eskom,” Mazzone said.

“By claiming that he was not aware that his daughter was involved with Impulse International, Koko inadvertently admits that he failed in his role as the Chief Accounting officer to conduct due diligence on the company profile of a potential Eskom service provider.”

Impulse International, of which Choma was a director until recently, was awarded eight contracts by Eskom’s generation unit during Koko’s tenure as the unit’s group executive.

“This potentially means that Eskom violated State Procurement guidelines set out by Treasury to guide the acquisition of services by State Owned Enterprises under Koko’s stewardship.”

She said it was not acceptable that, while Eskom was struggling to raise capital for some of its power generation projects needed to grow the economy, its managers could be busy “siphoning cash to benefit family members”.

The long-awaited Dentons report on Eskom sheds light on shocking financial abuses.

News24 used a Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA) application to obtain a copy of the report, which was commissioned by the Eskom board in 2015.

Dentons, the law firm appointed to conduct an audit into “the status of the business and challenges experienced by Eskom,” identified serious cause for concern regarding the manner in which Eskom awarded contracts for the supply of diesel and coal, among other shortcomings.

According to the report, some of the contractors – who benefitted from the nearly R30 billion that Eskom spent on diesel for its open cycle gas turbines between 2013 and 2015 – were companies that had no footprint in the industry and that may have been set up by Eskom employees themselves, News24 reported.

News24