Trade union Solidarity announced on Friday that they had offered to help address skills shortages and called for a commission of inquiry into the crisis at State-owned power utility, Eskom.

Solidarity chief executive Dirk Hermann said the best investment that can be made in Eskom right now was an investment in top skills, even if it is only for the interim to ease Eskom out of its crisis.

"Trade union Solidarity today launched a skills bank on its website where engineers and technicians can register so their skills can be re-recruited to help alleviate the crisis at Eskom," Hermann said.

"Eskom cannot afford the loss of a single skilled member of staff. If technical staff are now unsure about their jobs they will leave for safer companies, nationally and internationally, where major shortages of skilled staff are experienced."

The union said they planned to propagate the skills bank widely among its members, former members and their networks. 

This comes after Public Enterprises Minister, Pravin Gordhan, said Eskom needed to augment its engineering skills urgently as the high-level task team appointed by President Cyril Ramaphosa had found that 40 percent of technical breakdowns were due to the "human factor".

Gordhan said the services of competent former Eskom employees, locally and abroad, should be used to help alleviate Eskom's skills shortages.

Hermann called on Ramaphosa to appoint a commission of inquiry under the chairmanship of a judge to investigate the crisis, mismanagement and corrupt activities at Eskom. 

"The commission’s terms of reference must be such that the findings could be referred to the National Prosecuting Authority for prosecution," Hermann said.

Eskom is technically insolvent and could stop being a going concern by April if it doesn't get a bailout. The power utility has a debt of over R400-billion, and is expected to report a R20-billion loss in its 2018 financial year as a result of mounting operational costs.