What did the Zondo Commission find about state capture at Eskom?

Governments & official records

The Commission's Part IV report, released in 2022, has a chapter titled "The Capture of Eskom", alongside chapters on the attempted capture of National Treasury and other projects. The Presidency's July 2025 progress report on putting the Commission's recommendations into effect lists several Eskom-linked matters among the cases being pursued.

• State Capture Commission Report – Part IV, Volume I (Eskom) · thepresidency.gov.za
• Progress Report on Implementation of Actions in the President's Response to the Recommendations of the State Capture Commission · thepresidency.gov.za

Social & public sources

Devi Pillay, a former Zondo Commission researcher writing for GI ACE, says the Commission proposed sweeping governance reforms for state-owned companies such as Eskom, to stop patronage networks placing allies in key posts. She says the government's new model for governing these companies largely fails to deal with the problems the Commission raised.

• The legacy of the Zondo Commission · giace.org
• State Capture and the failure to implement the Zondo Commission's recommendations · opensecrets.org.za

Justice Council Political Analysis

From the public record of the Commission's Part IV report (April 2022), the Commission found that the Gupta enterprise captured Eskom, working through executives and board members who were placed in their posts and protected. The clearest case is Eskom being used to help the Gupta-owned company Tegeta buy Optimum Coal Mine. The source documents provided confirm that the Eskom chapter exists and name the cases that followed from it, but do not quote its findings.

The National Prosecuting Authority should take the Tegeta/Optimum Coal Mine and Eskom contract referrals to trial. Parliament should also amend the National State Enterprises Bill so that board appointments are actually insulated from patronage, rather than only centralised under one holding company.