South Africa's Eskom highlights municipal debt, electricity theft as major challenges

South Africa's state-owned power utility, Eskom, has singled out electricity theft and failure by municipalities to clear their debts as its main challenges.

Councils owe the group about $5bn which, Eskom chairman Mteto Nyathi said in a release accompanying the company's financials for the year ended March 2024, is making it difficult for it to restructure its distribution arm for greater operational efficiency.

He added that some consumers are stealing electricity, which worsens the group's financial standing.

"The two main issues keeping us awake at night are the unsustainable levels of municipal arrear debt, together with electricity theft, which includes illegal connections, meter tampering and ghost vending," he said in the report released on December 19

"These are arguably two sides of the same coin, as both speak to our values as a society and a general culture of lawlessness, where individuals can break the law without facing consequences."

Eskom will collaborate with the government, local authorities and the general public to tackle the challenge, he said "and that we are paid for our product, with all participants in the electricity value chain paying their rightful share."

Since March 2024, electricity supply in Africa's most modern economy and its largest, has been improving, he noted, adding that Eskom targets to increase available capacity by 3, 000 megawatts by 2026.