Seabata Mahao
Fuel supply company Puma Energy Ls Pty Ltd plans to engage local transportation companies to deliver its products from South Africa and distribute them around the country.
This was disclosed by the new Puma general manager, Stephane Neutsha, in a roundtable chat with journalists this week.
Neutsha was appointed in September 2022 to lead Puma Lesotho operations and relations.
Speaking at the meeting, Neutsha said they would soon issue a tender inviting interested transport companies to carry its liquid energy from South African depots into Lesotho and distribute them country-wide to its dealerships.
He said Lesotho is one of the fast-developing African markets but is in dire need of a reliable supply of energy products.
“We need to revamp the way we do things, we need to transform ourselves by putting the customers at the heart of what we do,†Neutsha said.
“We have to bring sustainable and reliable energy to our customers. This need was made even more true with the sequence of global energy disruptions that the world has witnessed in the past years, Covid-19, then the Ukraine and Russia war, and global warming,†he added.
He said they aimed at taking a responsible approach to providing remote communities with energy, especially the highlands of Lesotho.
He said this they would do through their new initiatives including mobile energy supply to remote corners of the country, and opening three new filling stations across the country during 2023.
He further explained that Puma would strengthen technical and financial control support given to their dealers to help them achieve greater financial well-being.
Also, he said Puma, would invest in the retail network, revamp existing garages, and broaden its service offerings to meet the increasing needs of the customer.
“In the medium to long run, Puma Energy Lesotho intends to fully play its role to support the energy transition in Lesotho through the fuel of the future program.
“We have already started in some of our African countries such as Tanzania, Zambia, Malawi, and Ghana with projects such as LPG for clean cooking, or solar solution to our customers,†Neutsha explained.
Through the appointment of Neutsha to Lesotho, Puma is committing to seeing its vision of developing a strong and standalone business directly reporting to the head of Africa for quicker decision-making, increasing country autonomy, and Puma investments in the country becoming a reality.
