BusinessLive reports that Eskom has frozen all new appointments as well as pay increases and bonuses for senior management as it battles to reduce its crippling operating costs.  

Cost cutting is something that the new management team under acting CEO Phakamani Hadebe and the new board are grappling with as they attempt to turn around the state-owned power utility.  The freeze on salary increases and bonuses for top management was communicated to staff in an internal memo last week.  Eskom spokesman Khulu Phasiwe said there was still the possibility of small increases for lower-level staff as a result of the wage negotiations that kicked off last week.  However, Eskom chairman Jabu Mabuza said at a media briefing on Tuesday that Eskom would stress in its negotiations with employees that they needed to understand that the entity was experiencing difficulties.  Mabuza emphasised that nothing had been said so far about retrenchments, though he conceded that Eskom was too top heavy.  Even though pay scales and conditions of service of those in the upper ranks needed to be looked at, this did not mean that those at the lower ranks should lose their jobs as a result.

• Read this report by Linda Ensor in full at BusinessLive

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