Former Eskom CEO Matshela Koko is not convinced that Chief Justice Raymond Zondo wrote the State Capture Commission report.
If anything, charged Koko, the report was written elsewhere outside the commission.
Koko said this when he was speaking to Sunday World Engage this week about various issues, including his arrest and the review of Zondo’s report.
According to Koko, whose corruption charges emanating from the role he allegedly played in the state capture, were recently struck off the roll by the court, argued there was simply no way Zondo, who presided over the oral hearings segment of the commission, could have written the report.
The two do not align, said Koko, and that proves that somebody else wrote the report.
“When I read the report of Zondo in totality, I get the impression that it wasn’t written by him. The left-hand side and the right-hand side don’t talk to each other,” said Koko.
“On the one hand, it says Koko provided evidence that he paid for his trips to Dubai; on the other side, it says the Guptas paid for his trips to Dubai. The Eskom part of the Zondo report in its entirety is a poor report; it’s badly written.
“I get a sense that there was someone sitting elsewhere writing the report while we were testifying. The job was too big for one man called chief justice
Zondo to read all the documents. I am not convinced that he wrote the report himself.”
Koko insists that the report and its quality are very suspect, which is why he drags Zondo to court for a review battle. No one at the chief justice level would produce a report with so many flaws, Koko continued.
“To be honest with you, when I look at the report on Eskom, it lacks the rationality of a chief justice, which is why I find it difficult to believe that it’s him. The chief justice, or deputy chief Justice, that I experienced when I testified is not consistent with what is in the report.”
Koko said the only positive thing he got from the Zondo commission was the opportunity to tell his side of the story in his own words.
That was a crucial platform to put his version across and something he did not have the opportunity to do because of the commission’s oral hearings.
Said Koko: “My appearance was not a waste of my time; it gave me the opportunity to tell the story in my own words. A lot of people read the report and [noted that] what you read in the report is not consistent with the actual evidence that we heard and saw ourselves. Every time you get an opportunity to tell your story, it cannot be a waste of time, so the Zondo Commission is not a waste of time.”
Koko asserted that he thought the renewable energy lobby group and the coal mafia, against whom he resisted while at Eskom, were responsible for his problems.
He believes his refusal to sign off on Independent Power Producers (IPPs) in 2017, even after the then president Jacob Zuma announced their contracts would be signed during his state of the nation address, contributed to his persecution.
As if that were not enough, said Koko, he created more enemies when he pushed for a nuclear power station to be built against the popular grain.
Stopping Glencore’s advances to supply coal to Eskom was the final nail in his coffin because the company was convinced that its association with President Cyril Ramaphosa would make its life easier to get business in government through dubious means.
