The Strategic Fuel Fund holds South Africa's emergency crude oil at Saldanha Bay. In December 2015, as the oil price collapsed, acting chief executive Sibusiso Gamede sold the entire reserve — 10 million barrels — to Venus Rays (Glencore), Vesquin (Vitol) and Taleveras/Contango for about $281 million, at as little as $26–30 a barrel. The rationale offered was "stock rotation" of degrading crude. Energy Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson approved the transactions without reading the proposals.
When the sale became public in 2016 the Central Energy Fund and the SFF went to court to unwind it. In CEF v Venus Rays Trade and others (4305/18), delivered on 20 November 2020, Rogers J declared every decision to sell invalid: the due diligence was "incomplete", the representations about quality degradation "misleading", and Taleveras had paid inducements. But on "just and equitable" relief the court left the state paying restitution to the buyers it found innocent — CTSA $112 million, Vitol about $86 million plus $19 million in expenses. The SCA dismissed the fund's appeal in April 2022, remarking that it had "tried to play the victim when it was the author of the tainted sale". The Public Protector did not report on the Minister's conduct. The transactions are widely described as a R5 billion loss; the court record supports the dollar figures above.