In 1896, the British South Africa Company (BSA), established by Cecil John Rhodes, created a subsidiary called the African Concessions Syndicate (ACS).
[1]: 28 This syndicate obtained a concession in Southern Rhodesia which gave it the right to generate 250,000 kW at Victoria Falls for seventy-five years.
One, Victoria Falls was a poor choice as during the dry season, little water flowed, and secondly the transmission line technology at the time would result in too much electricity being lost over the distances required to the Witwatersrand.
[1]: 32 German banks, Deutsche and Dresdner, were the investors of the preference shares would ensure that machinery required in the future would be supplied by the AEG.
[2]: 166 [3]: 54 On 1 January 1907, VFPC purchased the General Electric Power Company, based on the Witwatersrand from ACS for £50,000 in cash and £100,000 in shares.
[4] The next power company on the Witwatersrand bought, was the Rand Central Electric Works Ltd which was also purchased in 1907 for £175,000 in debentures and the same amount in preference shares in VFPC.
[4] The latter placed conditions on concession which included one-year notice period to expropriate the company that could be exercised after fifteen years, and the calculation required to work out the purchase price.
[4][2]: 176 In May 1907, VFPC supplied electricity to the Johannesburg municipality and its tram network after the latter's contracted gas power plant was closed down due to a gassing and an explosion.
[1]: 84 A second report was commissioned by the South African government to investigate the condition of electricity supply in the country which would be needed to electrify the rail system.
After 15 months of negotiation between the ECB and VFTPC, which allowed Escom to be established, a compromise was reached in its attempt to build a new power plant.
In June 1925, a licence was issued for a 60 MW power plant that would be built and operated in Witbank by VFTPC but owned by Escom.
[1]: 126 The Klip Power Station, 6 km north of Vereeniging, was to be built on top of the land supplied with coal from the Springfield Colliery and water piped from the Vaal River.
[5]: 460 On 27 January 1942, members of the military wing of the Ossewa Brandwag, the Stormjaers, under orders from Nazi agents in Mozambique, blew up an electricity pylon supplying Krugersdorp, but it was repaired four hours later.
[1]: 139 The strike was based on lack of progress in improving the wages and living conditions of the Black workers that were housed in compounds on the VFTPC sites.
[1]: 139 After an August 1946 African Mine Workers' Union strike (AMWU), the gold producers saw the future need to automate their facilities to decrease labour and so reduce the wage bill and its effect on profits.
[9] Escom acquired the power stations at Rosherville, Simmer Pan, Vereeniging and Brakpan consisting of 298MW of capacity, 2,106 km of transmission lines, twelve major and six minor distribution sub-stations and 918 transformers.