CORRUPTION
LUMKILE MONDI: World Bank should review loan to Eskom
The ANC and its allies historically distrusted the World Bank ideologically until 2008, when the government asked the institution for a loan of $3.75bn to finance Eskom’s new coal-fired power stations. The World Bank found all the reasons why this was an excellent idea. Neither the confidential 2005 settlement between Hitachi and the US Securities and Exchange Commission for an "inaccurately recorded improper payment" to Chancellor House, nor its relationship with the ANC could damp its appetite. In 1996, when the then minister of finance Trevor Manuel was negotiating a loan of $46m with the World Bank for the Industrial Competitiveness and Job Creation Project, the ANC, its allies and other organisations opposed to borrowing from the World Bank and the IMF were on the streets to demand answers. In 2008, they all stayed indoors.
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