• The Resource Mobilisation Fund (RMF) was established following a request from the President for the business sector to help capacitate the Presidency’s National Energy Crisis Committee (NECOM). NECOM aims to reduce the severity and frequency of load shedding in the short term and achieve a secure and sustainable supply of energy for South Africa in the long term.
• It was set up to source funding to procure and then donate capacity into government, and specifically NECOM, on an expedited basis.
• Legal, tax, regulatory and technical advice was provided to the RMF to establish the most effective structure for its activities.
• The RMF received PBO status from SARS for: “The provision of funds, assets, services, or other expertise by way of donation to department of state or administration in the national or provincial or local sphere of government of the Republic, contemplated in section 10(1)(a).”

1. The RMF perform its functions independently of government, including NECOM and business advocacy structures.
2. The RMF fundraises from donors that include South African corporates and international donors.
3. It receives requests for resources from the Presidency under an agreement between the RMF and the Presidency
4. It runs an independent procurement process to source the required capacity that is needed by the Presidency.
5. The RMF board is responsible for the final procurement decision and is advised by a procurement advisory panel, made up of both public and private sector procurement experts.
6. Having determined the appropriate resource, the service provider is contracted by the RMF, and then made available to the Presidency as a resource, as required by NECOM.
7. Certain operational functions of the RMF, including procurement and reporting functions, have been outsourced to service providers, although only the RMF Board has the authority to make procurement and deployment decisions.
8. Funds will be used by the RMF to procure capacity that will then be donated for use at NECOM. Capacity will be sourced from both institutional and individual service providers, and is likely to include legal advice, project management, energy policy, energy modelling and communications services, amongst others.
9. The RMF will be responsible for payment to and contracting of these service providers.
10. No money will be donated to government.
11. The resources are expected to be donated to government for a period of between one to two years depending on the pace of progress that NECOM makes in its mission.

• The RMF has been set up as a voluntary association, there are no shareholders as in a corporate entity.
• The RMF has 4 directors:
  1. Martin Kingston (Chair)
  2. Cas Coovadia
  3. Phumzile Langeni
  4. Faith Khanyile

Under the terms of the agreement with the Presidency, the Government has the right to nominate a director that is independent of the Government to the Board.

The RMF will receive funding from philanthropic and corporate donors in South Africa and internationally. The conclusion of the funders’ process is being advanced, and once finalised a list of all of our funders will be published on our website.

Funds will be used by the RMF to procure capacity that will then be donated for use at NECOM. Capacity will be sourced from both institutional and individual service providers, and is likely to include legal advice, project management, energy policy, energy modelling and communications services, amongst others. The RMF will be responsible for payment to and contracting of these service providers. No money will be donated to government. The resources are expected to be donated to government for a period of between one to two years depending on the pace of progress that NECOM makes in its mission.

NECOM, which reports to the President, determines its own goals. NECOM is responsible for determining its resource and capacity requirements. At present, the RMF is only being utilised in relation to NECOM and the energy crisis.

The RMF will simply procure additional capacity for use by NECOM.  The RMF Board will consider all capacity requests from NECOM.  The RMF may decline to provide support if the support requested exceeds available resources or is beyond the scope and purpose of the agreement between the Presidency and the RMF. Similarly, the government can decline any candidate/organisation proposed for appointment by the RMF and donation to the Presidency. The RMF does not undertake policy-related advocacy of any kind with the Presidency.

The fund has been set up to enable it to potentially offer additional capacity/resourcing in the future, should this be requested by the Government, related to other policy responses to the economic crises our country faces. However, donations have only been made so far in relation to the energy crisis. The RMF will continue report to its donors and other stakeholders on a regular basis whilst the resources are being donated to Government.

Motlanalo have been appointed as auditors of the fund.

The RMF is independent of any business structure including B4SA. All decisions are taken independently by the RMF Board.

The energy crisis plan announced by the President at the end of July (“Energy Action Plan”) is a comprehensive and far-reaching response to the energy problem but is complex to implement.  At the same time, the government set up the National Energy Crisis Committee (“NECOM”) as a structure to coordinate its response to the energy crisis, including implementing the Energy Action Plan, across all of the government and related stakeholders.

The RMF is providing specific expertise to NECOM for use within NECOM. NECOM will report back to the RMF on the status of the Energy Project and the use of the donated resources.

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BUSA is contracted under a Service Level Agreement to provide some back-office functions for the RMF Board, including PMO and expert technical advice. Cas Coovadia who is one of the RMF Board members, is also the CEO of Business Unity South Africa (BUSA).

The RMF is independent of both the government and business structures.  The government is entitled to nominate a director to the board of the RMF, although this director must act independent of government.

The RMF exists only to receive and raise donations, procure capacity and skillsets, donate these to NECOM and then report back appropriately. Unlike the Energy Council and other bodies, the RMF does not undertake any policy advocacy and, other than its sole focus of capacitating government, is not involved in addressing the energy crisis.

No, the RMF is an independent body with four directors all of whom are independent of Government.

The resources to be donated by RMF will be used across NECOM’s 9 workstreams, working towards the reduction of loadshedding and ultimately a sustainable energy solution for South Africa. NECOM’s short term objective is to reduce the severity and frequency of loadshedding. However, to make a substantive impact on the crisis NECOM is having to undertake complex, rapid, regulatory, legislative and policy changes which requires skills not readily available within the public sector. It is the RMF’s job to ensure such skills are available to NECOM in a timely manner such that any shortfall in capacity and skills are not a blockage in solving the energy crisis.

The RMF Board will be responsible for all procurement decisions. A separate monitoring and evaluation function will be implemented, and regular quarterly reporting will be provided to donors to account for the use of funds. NECOM will also provide reporting/updates on both the NECOM project, and the specific resources donated by the RMF.

Yes, similar to how the Solidarity Fund was set up and managed, there will be a wide range of documents and details put into the public domain by the RMF to transparently demonstrate how it operates.

RFPs will be issued into the public domain at the appropriate time as capacity is being procured. This will be done in an open and transparent manner.

BBBEE status will be a consideration for the evaluation criteria for all procurement decisions, although the priority will be to ensure the correct expertise, skillset, track record and experience is procured and donated to the Presidency.