Ngubane tells MPs to ‘bring on’ probe into Eskom affairs:

ESKOM board chairman Dr Ben Ngubane has dared MPs‚ telling them he “loved” their idea of criminal investigations into the power utility because he and his team had nothing to hide.

Ngubane was speaking during a tense meeting of parliament’s standing committee on public accounts, which was called to discuss Eskom’s questionable coal supply deal with the Guptalinked firm Tegeta.

Eskom faced a grilling from MPs on the basis of a PricewaterhouseCoopers review of its coal supply contracts.

But a clearly incensed Ngubane told lawmakers “bring it on”, saying he was not afraid of any probe into the affairs of Eskom.

“Bring the investigation. We will love it. We want to clear our names. We don’t want to be so tarnished as we are,” he said.

“Bring on the investigations. I’m very happy the minister has ordered the SIU [Special Investigating Unit] to come in.

“Let them come in‚ let them pick up whatever is criminal. As far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing criminal that we have done.”

Explaining the more than R600-million advance payment to Tegeta‚ Ngubane said this happened “all the time” with other coal suppliers.

Public Enterprises Minister Lynne Brown said last week she had referred the Tegeta coal deal and all Eskom procurement from 2007 onwards to the SIU. – TMG Digital/TimesLIVE