The National Treasury is working on a solution to restructure Eskom's R400 billion debt burden, which it hopes to put to the Cabinet ministers' committee on the budget by October.
The problem of what to do about Eskom's debt has been a significant issue for SA's risk profile and the budget since 2018. But due to uncertainty in government over what route to take, no progress has been made. This is the first time that the Treasury is doing the technical work to explore what debt relief for Eskom would mean for the fiscus and on under what conditions it could be credibly done.
It follows Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana's commitment in the budget in February that a solution to the Eskom debt would be finalised within a year. Godongwana also said that it was also up to Eskom to take steps to fix itself, by selling assets and cutting costs to demonstrate that it would not be in the same situation again further down the line.
