High Court orders Eskom must take over 8 big power users from Gauteng municipality
Eskom has welcomed the North Gauteng High Court’s order that Emfuleni Local Municipality (ELM) hand over eight industrial customers’ electricity services to the power utility.
Emfuleni comprises the cities Vereeniging and Vanderbijlpark, and the much larger townships of Sebokeng and Evaton.
The court found the municipality was in contempt of a previous court order handed down in 2018.
Its continued failure to pay its outstanding debt to Eskom was also found unlawful and unconstitutional.
“This court judgement comes after the municipality failed to adhere to an order issued in November 2018, where relief was granted to eight ELM industrial customers to pay Eskom directly,” the state-owned power utility said on Friday.
“The court ordered the ELM to appoint Eskom as its service delivery agent to perform all functions and services relating to the municipality’s electricity business on behalf of the municipality,” Eskom explained.
“This order was not adhered to due to non-compliance by the municipality.”
The court found that ELM had collected 90% of customers’ electricity bills — amounting to about R4.5 billion — but failed to pay Eskom for it.
Eskom and the customers approached the court to seek relief on the matter in March 2023.
On 5 July 2023, the court found in favour of the utility and ordered that industrial customers pay Eskom directly, pending the implementation of a six-month agreement between the power utility and the municipality.
“The two parties are further ordered to implement and finalise the terms of this agreement within six months from the date of the order subject to the appropriate oversight from the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa),” Eskom added.
The court said Nersa had either intentionally refused to intervene in the matter, as was its responsibility, or simply failed to do so.
It ordered that the municipality and Nersa pay the costs of the application.
Eskom said it was a responsible organ of the state and intended to comply with this order and looks forward to working with Emfuleni to ensure that service delivery becomes a core focus.
“The partnership between the power utility and municipality will benefit the customers, stakeholders, and community at large,” Eskom said.
Emfuleni is home to many operations of major industrial companies — including ArcelorMittal, formerly known as Iscor.
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