The One Time It Feels Good to Say; “Karpowership”

After three years OUTA has won a Pretoria High Court order declaring Karpowership licences invalid and overturned.

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.”