Cele: Police probing number of sabotage cases at Eskom

He says some culprits have gone to great lengths to damage power stations. 

He cited an instance where saboteurs painted rocks to pass them off as coal at bogus coal yards before they were taken to the utility for processing. 

Cele addressed the Standing Committee on Public Accounts on Tuesday, which summoned law enforcement bodies to give details on their investigations into alleged corruption at the power producer. 

"Sabotage become a technical murder because those belts and machines instead of grinding coal, will grind stones and then there's a short life and the maintenance is pushed in a way that is not supposed to."

He says they have made arrests with some suppliers, staff and the entity's former managers taken in.

 "Those people who take trucks and put wrong coal and I have received the briefing that there were arrests on those matters. At one time, about 17 of them were arrested."

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 Cele reiterated the response of police commissioner Fannie Masemola, saying that they had no knowledge of any police investigation into politicians suspected of corrupt activities at Eskom as had been stated by former CEO Andre de Ruyter. 

"I asked individually, and everyone said no, not a single report has come about these politicians."