Nelisiwe Magubane appointed new chairperson of Strategic Fuel Fund

The Strategic Fuel Fund, the state-owned entity that manages South Africa's strategic crude oil stockpile, has appointed Nelisiwe Magubane as its new chairperson with immediate effect.

Magubane served as director general for the Department of Energy between 2009 and 2014. She takes over from interim chairperson, Dr Monde Mnyande, who is also the chairperson of the Central Energy Fund.

As chairperson, Magubane will oversee the fund's court action to invalidate the controversial sale of SA's strategic oil stocks in late 2015.

A forensic probe into the sale of 10.3 million barrels of the country's strategic oil reserves - at a price of around $28 per barrel when the price of brent crude oil was around $37-$44 per barrel - was completed last year.

In March 2016 - three months after the sale took place, then-energy minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson claimed in her annual budget vote speech that the fuel had not been sold, but rotated. But in early 2017 her successor, former minister of energy Mmamoloko Kubayi, admitted the stock had in fact been sold off.