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ANC spokesperson Dakota Legoete is in the dark why his colleague Zizi Kodwa issued a hasty apology to Public Enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan and ANC head of organising Senzo Mchunu on the Eskom “black professionals” row, City Press has learnt.
Mchunu had told City Press in Thohoyandou in Limpopo last Friday that “fake” black managers were responsible for Eskom’s load shedding troubles.
And Gordhan’s announcement in Parliament last week that top engineers from Italy would come on board to help solve Eskom’s problems caused consternation from the “ANC professional league”, which claims to represent the middle class and working professionals. The league interpreted it as “a scheme which will empower foreign professionals at the expense of home-grown talent”.
A Luthuli House insider said on Friday that although Legoete penned the initial Wednesday statement lashing Mchunu and Gordhan, it was Kodwa who issued the Thursday apology – and Legoete was in the North West doing ANC work. Legoete would not have the facts, said the high-ranking source.
Legoete’s initial statement condemned the “attack on black professionals” in utterances attributed to both Mchunu and Gordhan, saying it was “neither warranted nor acceptable and goes against the grain of ANC policy”.
The insider said that neither Mchunu nor Gordhan had refuted the newspaper reports at the time the statement was released. Because of the utterances “the ANC suffered a backlash of more than 20 000 negative comments on social media”.
In a letter addressed to ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule on Thursday, Gordhan said he rejected the ANC’s assertions and that he found them “extremely offensive”.
“I want to state emphatically that I have not made any statements diminishing the status of black engineers,” Gordhan’s letter read.
He added: “It would appear that some individuals at Luthuli House give more credence to the orchestrated utterances of individuals like [former Eskom boss] Matshela Koko, who has done so much damage at Eskom”.
Koko was a former Eskom executive linked to allegations of corruption at the utility.
Accordingly, said Gordhan, “I must insist on a retraction and an apology from the ANC spokesperson”.
Moments later Kodwa said that the ANC, “following a thorough investigation on statements attributed to both [Gordhan] and [Mchunu], has established that their remarks were taken out of context”.
“The ANC extends an unreserved apology to both Cde Mchunu and Gordhan for its statement issued following these media reports”.
Here is the full response to the question that City Press asked Mchunu during the party’s 107th anniversary and fundraising gala dinner in Thohoyandou, Limpopo, last Friday.
City Press: What is your view on claims that the Eskom crisis is a sabotage?
Senzo Mchunu: Well, I won’t agree but I won’t deny that there could be one or two things inside. But…
City Press: Inside where?
Mchunu: Inside … inside Eskom. I can tell you one thing, that we will regret calling some of our black managers as people of excellence, because what has happened in most of the parastatals, those people that we trusted, that indeed they are black managers, and we entrusted them … they have proved to be fake. They became excellent in failure, and looting, and in causing harm. We still have to have an appointment as a nation with them, where they have to face up to what is it that happened. But I’m saying, the main thing, let’s not focus on where the problem is, let’s focus on fixing the problem. Of course, it means we need to know. And I think the minister of public enterprises, and all the other efforts; the direction is the right one. We are going to fix the problem
