Jeff Radebe signed IPPs to benefit Patrice Motsepe?

Former Energy Minister Jeff Radebe is still irritated by claims that by authorising Independent Power Producers (IPPs) to supply the government, he was creating a market for his brother-in-law Patrice Motsepe.

This was in 2018, just a year before leaving public office, and the accusation further goes that this was a "javelin".

A javelin in political parlance refers to a deal a public office bearer signs with a company they are about to join.

The 27 projects Radebe authorised totalled R56-billion.

Radebe expressed his irritation during a wide-ranging interview with Sunday World Engage this week.  He called it a "fiction written by fools who don't know what they're talking about".

The narrative is so far-fetched because, at the time he signed the IPPs, he said, he had no clue that Motsepe, who is no longer his sbali, had a presence in the renewable energy space.

He said the talk was meant to create a wrong impression that he was the father of IPPs when in fact all he did was implement things he found on his desk.

For that matter, Radebe charged that the decision on IPPs was taken by the ANC as far back as 1997, and information peddlers would not know this.

The attempt to attribute the decision to his ex-brother-in-law, billionaire Motsepe, was simply absurd.

Radebe said he never concerned himself with who were the companies that operated in the IPP space.

For that matter, he had never done Motsepe a single favour during his 25-year stint as member of the national Cabinet since 1994.

The former ANC presidential candidate is adamant that the ANC controls the energy mix and will not tolerate individual blame.

He said what he in fact signed in 2018 was Bid Window 4 of IPPs. This was supposed to be signed by his predecessor-the late Tina Joemat-Pettersson, who chickened out because of unions.

He believed that opposition parties were primarily responsible for the controversy.

"This thing [rumour] was started in 1997, in the [ANC] Mafikeng conference, where the ANC decided we need to ensure that we also have IPPs. The energy white paper that was developed and piloted by former Minister of Energy Penuel Maduna was accepted," said Radebe.

"When the [Zuma] government took over in 2009, they accelerated that program, and Minister Patel even arranged a social pact of government, business, labour, and communities via Nedlac to accept this renewable energy. Parliament accepted it.

"Minister Joemat-Pettersson started Bid Window 1 to 3. The one I signed was Bid Window 4.

"This fiction that IPPs came with me is a blue lie. Renewable energy is a necessary source of energy; we cannot always rely on coal. I didn't even know who the players were."

Patrice Motsepe is founder of African Rainbow Energy and Power, which is a significant IPP.

Radebe said the idea he did favours for Motsepe was far-fetched since he didn't do any for his then - wife now, Bridgette Motsepe - a seasoned businesswoman.

Radebe said he decided to never mix politics with business the day he took up the role in government as Minister of Public Works in 1994.

If Radebe wanted to go into business, he said, he would have followed in the footsteps of his childhood friend and now tycoon Mzi Khumalo.

Radebe declined to say if he would consider running for ANC president in 2027.

His priority, he said, for now, was rebuilding ANC structures in KZN and reclaiming the party's legitimacy with the residents of the province.