Johannesburg – South Africa’s elite crime busters – the Hawks – have tracked down and arrested a 27-year-old suspect accused of making a “bomb threat” against Eskom boss Jan Oberholzer.
Earlier this year in May, the Eskom Group Chief Operating Officer received a bomb threat from an unknown cellphone number and the matter was reported to the police.
On Friday morning the Hawks and contracted investigators from Bidvest Protea Coin traced and arrested the suspect.
“Targeting of Eskom executives and employees who are focused and hard at work during these difficult times, is very disturbing,” said the power utility’s General Manager Advocate Karen Pillay.
“Such acts of criminality are malicious and Eskom takes them seriously.”
The suspect was arrested in the Vosman area in eMalahleni, Mpumalanga.
Authorities said there was “overwhelming evidence” linking him to the crime.
Advocate Pillay said other Eskom executives have also been targeted in recent months.
“We are grateful to the Hawks Head Office team for their successful investigations and efforts in tracing the suspect at a time when they have many other serious crimes demanding their focus and priority,” said Advocate Pillay.
Earlier this week, a contractor working at Camden Power Station in Mpumalanga was arrested after being linked to an incident of sabotage.
RELATED: Two Truckers Caught Stealing Coal From Kendal Power Station – The Bulrushes
Commenting on the matter during a press briefing earlier in the week, Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele said: “We are excited about the arrests. The arrests have been ongoing; other matters are in the prosecutorial space.
“South Africans, I doubt if they have got a measure of how fraud and corruption has actually deepened the Eskom problem or even damaging through the coals.
Eskom, which is struggling with frequently failing generation units and devastating graft, urges the public to report information about crimes directed at the power utility or its staff to Eskom Crime Line 0800 11 27 22.
Meanwhile, Eskom said the implementation of load-shedding will be maintained at Stage 4 until further notice.
“The higher stage of load-shedding is mainly due to the high level of breakdowns and the depleted emergency generation reserves,” Eskom said Friday in a power alert.
Changes in the stages of load-shedding will be more erratic due to the absence of the buffer that is normally provided by the diesel generation capacity between generating unit breakdowns.
“Since Friday morning a generating unit each at Kendal and Kriel power stations was taken offline for repairs,” explained Eskom.
“Delays in returning to service a unit each at Arnot, Grootvlei, Hendrina, and Tutuka power stations have contributed to the capacity constraints.”
Eskom said a generating unit each at Camden, Kriel, Tutuka, and two units at Majuba power stations were returned to service.
“We currently have 4 887MW on planned maintenance, while another 15 320MW of capacity is unavailable due to breakdowns,” said Eskom.
“Load-shedding is implemented only as a last resort in view of the shortage of generation capacity and the need to attend to breakdowns.”
