Transnet has African ambitions

TRANSNET’S brand-new electric locomotives will never win any beauty pageants.

But they might — if Transnet chief executive Brian Molefe has his way — blaze a fresh trail for the company into Africa.

Molefe and Zhou Qinghe, president of CSR Zhuzhou Electric Locomotive Company, which is building the first 10 of the 95 units, were on hand to see the two gleaming steel boxes ease out of the depot in Pretoria.

Zheng said the locomotives — “developed with our soul and heart to express our respect for [former president] Nelson Mandela” — marked the beginning of further cooperation between the two countries to develop South Africa’s railway business.

Invoking the spirit of lunar explorer Neil Armstrong, Molefe said the deal, which will see 85 locomotives built here, was a small step for Transnet but “a giant leap” for South Africa.

“It’s a different way of doing business,” he said. “We are no longer just buying equipment.”

A production line has been set up at Transnet Engineering’s works at Koedoespoort where 85 of the locomotives will be assembled, and 132 Transnet technicians have been trained at the CSR factory in Zhuzhou.

The first locally built unit is due out of the works in January.

Molefe said the entire order was on track to be completed by the end of March 2015, “despite media reports that the locomotives were not going to be delivered or were going to be late”.

Molefe noted that massive industrialisation in the 1970s had resulted in China’s economy growing at more than 10% a year for three decades.

“There is no other country in the world that has taken as many people as China out of poverty into relative comfort,” he said.

South Africa was now poised to follow the same path, Molefe said. “We have a huge opportunity to build and sell [locomotives and rail equipment] to the African continent.”

The 20E locomotives are dual voltage so they can operate on both Transnet’s 3kV and 25kV networks. They will work on manganese trains between the Northern Cape and Coega.

Transnet Freight Rail chief executive Siyabonga Gama said the company planned to boost annual capacity on the line from 7 million tons currently to 16 million tons in the next six years.