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Image: Wikimedia
Goodbye, Karpowerships!
- OUTA wins case in Pretoria High Court which overturns the Karpowership licences.
- This is the end of the government attempts to contract the Karpowerships.
- The court case took three years but OUTA believes it was worth it.
Today (Thursday 31 July) the Pretoria High Court granted the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) an order ruling that the three Karpowership electricity generation licences issued are invalid and overturned them.
The licences were issued by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa), and were a crucial step in the government’s plan to sign 20-year deals with the floating power stations as “emergency” electricity. The deals were expected to have cost about R200 billion over the 20 years, an amount that would have been added to the price of electricity.
The OUTA case was filed on 26 April 2022, and called for the court to review Nersa’s decisions to grant the licences. It resulted in a three-year fight, including a long dispute over access to documents. OUTA believes this case contributed significantly to the collapse of the Karpowership deals, as Eskom eventually cancelled the grid access.
The removal of the generation licences is the final end of this deal.
OUTA regards this as a significant legal victory, and a huge victory for the public.
“The Karpowership deals are now absolutely dead. It will never be loaded onto your electricity bill,” says Advocate Stefanie Fick, Executive Director of OUTA.
“This ruling is a powerful affirmation that decisions involving billions in public funds must comply with the law. We challenged this process because the public deserves transparency, proper oversight, and value for money, none of which were present in this licensing saga.”
Ruling and costs
The court order says the “decision of the first respondent [Nersa] to award a generation licence to the second respondent [Karpowership]” was “reviewed and set aside”, for each of the three generation licences.
The court order confirmed a settlement agreement drawn up between OUTA and Nersa. Karpowership had been cited in the case and initially opposed it, but withdrew a few months ago.
As part of the settlement agreement, Nersa agreed to withdraw its opposition to OUTA’s review application, and the court formally set aside the impugned licences.
Furthermore, the court ordered the first respondent, Nersa, to pay the costs of the application on a party-and-party scale, including fees for two counsel, calculated on Scale C (the highest scale). This reflects the seriousness of the matter and the substantial public interest involved.
Our legal team consisted of Andri Jennings, our attorney from Jennings Inc, and Adv Sonika Mentz and Adv Jannet Gildenhuys SC.
Background: A long battle for accountability
The generation licences in question were issued in 2021 as part of the Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (RMIPPPP), which aimed to urgently address South Africa’s electricity shortfall.
OUTA launched its review application in April 2022, citing multiple legal and procedural concerns, including:
- Absence of required environmental authorisations and port approvals;
- Lack of confirmed power purchase agreements with Eskom;
- Criminal investigations pending against the Karpowership entities;
- Significant long-term financial risks to the public without adequate regulatory scrutiny.
The case was delayed for nearly two years due to disputes over access to the administrative record. OUTA had demanded a copy of the full record of Nersa’s decisions, with the full reasons for decisions, as part of the review process. Both Nersa and Karpowership had objected.
Following a court order compelling the production of documents in 2024, the Karpowership entities were subsequently liquidated, and their attorneys withdrew from the matter in June 2025.
Despite the lack of opposition, OUTA pushed to ensure the matter was formally adjudicated and made part of the public record through an order of court. The full record was eventually made available, but parts are blocked from public access.
“This is not just a legal win, it’s a win for public interest litigation,” says Fick.
“This case reinforces the principle that even when government acts urgently, the law and due process cannot be ignored. This judgment protects the public from being locked into a flawed and costly energy deal, and it strengthens the principle that administrative decisions must be lawful, rational, and in the public interest.
“OUTA will continue to challenge unlawful conduct, especially where public money and the environment are at risk. This ruling proves that oversight matters and that the courts are willing to act when decision-makers fail the country.”
More information
A soundclip with comment by Advocate Stefanie Fick, OUTA Executive Director for Accountability, in English is here and in Afrikaans is here.
The settlement agreement which was made an order of court on 31 July 2025 is here.
More on OUTA’s work on this case is here.
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In September 2024, we exposed the dodgy driving licence card machine contract and, as a result, the Minister of Transport moved to cancel it in March 2025 (see here).
In April 2024, the Gauteng e-tolls were officially switched off after our long campaign lasting more than a decade (see more here).
We have published six annual reports assessing the work of Parliament (see more here).
In April 2023, we won a court order overturning the national State of Disaster on electricity (see more here).
In 2022-2024, we were in court challenging the Karpowership generation licences, and effectively blocked this project (see more here).
We have been demanding access to information on toll concessionaire profits since 2019, and are now involved in court cases challenging this secrecy (see more here).
In May 2020, we had former SAA chair Dudu Myeni declared a delinquent director for life (see more here).
We campaign against state capture and have opened criminal cases against high-profile implicated people (see more here).
We regularly challenge unreasonably high electricity prices.
We want to see South Africa’s tax revenue and public funds used for the benefit of all, not a greedy few.
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