Future South Africa said McKinsey’s acknowledgement of its role in the malfeasance at Eskom is “a little too late”.
On Tuesday, the global consultancy firm admitted that it made “several errors of judgment” in the way it handled contracts with South African power supplier, Eskom, adding that it was not careful enough about who it associated with when taking such contracts.
Earlier this month Eskom demanded that McKinsey and Gupta-linked firm Trillian Capital Partners’ return R1 billion and R564 million respectively. The money was paid to them “unlawfully” for services without contracts between 2016 and 2017.
Mckinsey has come under the spotlight for business deals with Eskom since 2015 and the way it conducted itself with its empowerment partners Trillian and Regiments Capital. McKinsey faces allegations that it corruptly secured the controversial R1.6 billion six-month contract with Eskom and was paid for little or no work done.
Future South Africa said that McKinsey had finally reached the conclusions that South Africans came to a few months ago without the benefit of internal information, but through compelling evidence by whistle-blowers, the media and civil society.
“Despite its internal report which tries to justify its involvement in the Eskom saga as legitimate, in the eyes of South Africans, the company still stands accused of criminal complicity in the capture of our state by powerful business interests colluding with prominent political leaders and public sector officials,” Future SA said.
It supported the call by Corruption Watch for an independent investigation into the matter, and that McKinsey should cooperate with the investigation.
“We call on McKinsey to submit a complaint under the Prevention and Combatting of Corrupt Activities Act in respect of the activities of its erstwhile director, Vikas Sagar,” Future SA said.
“McKinsey must help authorities investigate the conduct of its employees or former employees on the ESKOM contract. It’s not for McKinsey to tell South Africa that nothing unlawful happened. It’s for the authorities to do so,” it said.
