Zwilithini Witbooi
Zwilithini Witbooi is the General Manager Generation of Botswana Power Corporation . Mr. Witbooi joins BPC from ESKOM, South Africa where he was one of their most trusted operational leaders. His most recent responsibility in ESKOM was the turnaround of the Duvha Thermal Coal Power Plant, a plant of 6 x 600MW Turbines (Total 3600 MW).
Mr Witbooi has extensive experience in resolving complex problems at brown field projects with challenges similar to Morupule A and B. He has been involved throughout his career in South Africa with comparable projects; successful de-mothballing of old power plants which had been in cold storage for more than 15 years. The depth and breadth of his track record in such projects adds to BPC’s increasing strength and ability to overcome the current challenges in the BPC generation fleet.
He has led the modernization of power plants where new versus old technologies are integrated using a combination of engineering approaches such as refurbishment, retrofit, re-engineering of plant components, equipment, systems and processes. Leadership in this area is key to the success of BPC’s ongoing stabilization and remediation of Morupule B.
Zweli’s track record started with his involvement in the successful return to service of the Camden power station (8 x 200MW) and Komati power station (5 x 100MW, 4 X 125MW) between 2002 and 2008. He was later assigned to establish engineering capability to operate and maintain the Camden Power Station after it was returned to service and its performance had deteriorated to unacceptable levels. He was a key leader in the recovery of Camden’s technical performance to become one of Eskom’s top 5 performing stations. Camden Power Station now remains one of Eskom’s best performing stations despite the fact that it was built in the 1960’s.
His success at Camden Power Station resulted in his deployment as Technical Plant Manager to various major power stations with serious technical challenges to help Eskom steer its way out of the load shedding experienced due to poor performance of these power plants. After he led the successful turnaround of the Arnot Power Station (2,352 MW), ESKOM deployed him to the problematic Duvha Power Station after a major plant incident had crippled the plant. At Duvha he led the recovery of the plant’s performance as well as the overhaul of its deteriorated management systems.
He is known in the ESKOM fraternity for his hallmark leadership style: the combined strength of a hard task master with human interactive skills, and a proven ability to harness, direct and inspire teams to achieve goals.
Mr. Witbooi is an Electrical Engineer graduate of Wits University, and also completed a Senior Management Program with the Henley Business School.