Johannesburg - An energy breakthrough was felt yesterday in Mozambique after South African power and energy company DNG Energy was announced as Mozambique’s biggest supplier of LNG gas.
A country hit by power shortages and a limited scope of internal power generation, Mozambique has adopted a “coal and diesel to LNG model”.
The project started when CEO Aldworth Mbalati tested the feasibility of using LNG as an alternative to diesel, offering a proof of concept for a cleaner and more affordable option for transport, industrial power generation, and mining.
South Africa’s first LNG shipment landed in 2021 from Rotterdam, the Netherlands, making Mozambique the next historic move.
In recent months, DNG Energy made headlines when it took the Department of Minerals and Energy’s Minister Gwede Mantashe and director-general Thabo Moloi to court after Moloi allegedly solicited a bribe from Mbalati in order for DNG to win the R300 billion tender to produce emergency electricity.
Moloi did not deny inviting Mbalati to Kream Restaurant in Pretoria.
According to Mbalati, because of his refusal to pay the bribe solicited by Moloi and other “big guns” linked to Mantashe, the tender was won by the Turkish company Karpowership.
Receiving acclaim from anti-corruption bodies, Mbalati halted the tender by presenting to the court video evidence obtained by a private investigator of Moloi and two other people entering the booth at the restaurant.
The other personalities had denied being at the meeting.
Moloi soon after quietly left the department, with Mbalati taking him through his paces in court.
Speaking to The Star from Mozambique, Mbalati said yesterday: “They’re trying very hard to distract me from my business of power generation. I have not lost my house and am doing well. My next project is to look at the challenge of fuel to the continent. South Africa might face 'fuel shedding' in the future if it did not implement the Moerane Report recommendation of 2006 to keep 90 days’ strategic stock,” Mbalati said.
“Don’t ask me about media that says I owe money for art and that I’m evicted from my house. It’s the predictable work of sponsored media during an energy crisis. I’m here producing gas and power that may supply to half the continent in 2030, ask me about that,“ he said.
The Star