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London-based Independent Resources, which has assets in Tunisia and Egypt, has brought in three directors from ambitious Morocco player Sound Energy and plans to change its name to Echo Energy. Continental Investment Partners, which also has 10% in Sound, has taken a 29.9% share via its associate Greenberry plc. Sound chief executive James Parsons will join the company as non-executive chairman, while two other Sound directors, Marco Fumagalli and Stephen Whyte, will also join the board.

The transfer of management of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) to Power Distribution Services Ghana Ltd, which is owned by a consortium led by the Philippines’ Manila Electricity Company (Meralco), is expected to take place on 1 February, Millennium Development Authority (Mida) chief executive Martin Eson-Benjamin told a media briefing in Accra this month.Mida is responsible for implementing Ghana’s $469.3m compact with the US’ Millennium Challenge Corporation.

The heads of two companies involved in the Independent Power Tanzania Ltd (IPTL) power plant saga are jointly facing charges of economic sabotage, forgery, impersonation, running a criminal syndicate, obtaining money by false pretence, and causing loss of money to the government.Pan Africa Power Solutions chairman Harbinder Singh Sethi and VIP Engineering managing director James Rugemalira appeared in Kisutu Resident Magistrates’ Court in Dar es Salaam on 19 June to hear the charges

A judge has ruled that energy minister Matthew Nkhuwa acted illegally by declaring the Copperbelt Energy Corporation network common carrier last year. The ruling has been widely welcomed by the industry but the dispute is by no means over, writes Chiwoyu Sinyangwe in Lusaka.

President Filipe Nyusi has been working to raise Mozambique’s attractiveness to investors during a period when growth rates have dipped, and currency and political risks have risen. Promising signs have included a welcome easing of visa procedures and a more sympathetic ear given to major investors. The macroeconomic picture is improving: growth, which halved from its strong performance of recent years to 3.5% in 2016, will rise to 4.5% in 2017, with further improvement after that, Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM) chairman and chief executive Mateus Magala told the Africa Energy Forum (AEF) in Copenhagen.

Zesco has set up a team headed by cabinet secretary Roland Msiska to implement proposed reforms to the utility, though concrete action is unlikely until after the 2021 presidential and general elections. The cabinet commissioned a diagnostic study in 2017 which made a list of recommendations.A source at the Ministry of Energy said the study recommended that Zesco be split into separate generation, transmission and distribution units. The report also called on the government to rein in Zesco’s wage bill, which absorbs 65% of revenues.

An Italian court has sentenced two middlemen to four years in prison for their role in Royal Dutch Shell and Eni’s 2011 acquisition of OPL 245. Emeka Obi and Gianluca Di Nardo had opted for a fast-track trial, while a larger trial including Royal Dutch Shell, Eni and 13 other defendants is ongoing.

The Africa Trade Insurance Agency (ATI) has announced an interim replacement for George Oduor Otieno, who is fighting his sacking as chief executive of Africa’s largest insurer. The ATI board decided in early May to sack Otieno, and his job was advertised before he had been informed. In late May, Kenya’s Employment and Labour Relations Court blocked the move. Lady Justice Maureen Onyango said ATI’s decision to advertise the job when the petitioner was still in office was “unconstitutional and discriminative”.

Africa Oil Corporation has opened a London office with effect from 1 September, staffed by chief executive Keith Hill, chief operating officer Tim Thomas and vice president exploration Paul Martinez. Technical and accounting staff will remain in Calgary. “This relocation is designed to facilitate greater access to the investment community, partners in our existing ventures and deal flow in the current highly prospective growth market for oil and gas assets,” the company said.

Eskom chief executive Phakamani Hadebe has resigned due to ill health, the struggling utility announced on 24 May. “It is no secret that this role comes with unimaginable demands which have unfortunately had a negative impact on my health. In the best interests of Eskom and my family, I have therefore decided to step down,” an Eskom statement quoted Hadebe as saying.Hadebe, who will step down at the end of July, was the eighth chief executive since 2010, if those filling the role in an acting capacity are included.

The board of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) has set out how members should report payments at project level in its 51 implementing countries, a month after President Donald Trump cancelled a US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) rule requiring US companies to detail their payments.

Ahmed Nakkouch, founding head of Morocco’s biggest private developer and a former head of state utility Office National de l’Electricité, is retiring from Nareva. He will be replaced by 46-year-old Aymane Taud, a director of Nareva’s parent company Société Nationale d’Investissement (SNI) since November 2006. Taud was appointed head of SNI’s fisheries companies Marona and Arpem in mid-2015. He came to SNI after heading BMCE Capital Conseil.

Peter Bosshard left campaign group International Rivers on 22 December and will take up a new position on 1 February as director of the finance programme of the Sunrise Project, leading a new campaign to accelerate the shift from fossil fuels to clean energy. Under Bosshard’s leadership, International Rivers has campaigned vigorously against large dam projects in Africa. The NGO has been a staunch critic of the Inga scheme in Democratic Republic of Congo, which it argues will not benefit most Congolese, and has gathered evidence of the problems encountered by communities resettled as part of Sudan’s Merowe dam project.

AIM-listed Wentworth Resources announced on 13 November that chief executive Eskil Jersing was stepping down from the board and leaving the company with immediate effect. Jersing joined Wentworth in June 2018 with a mandate to drive the business forward, but the share price has declined steadily since then.

In a continuing reshuffle of parastatal heads and other senior posts by the outgoing prime minister, Youssef Chahed, his Tahya Tounès party ally Leila Ouled Ali Bahri is to become head of Steg Energies Renouvelables (ER), the renewables affiliate of state utility Société Tunisienne de l’Electricité et du Gaz. Created in 2010 to promote solar projects, Steg ER has public and a few private sector shareholders, not all of whom are said to be happy with Chahed’s last-minute ‘political’ appointment.