On Molefe it is clear that we are being sold a bald-faced lie

Eskom's board and Public Enterprises Minister Lynne Brown appear to inhabit an alternative reality to the rest of South Africa.

This can be the only explanation for their apparent bewilderment at the public outcry over former/current CEO Brian Molefe's reinstatement/withdrawal of resignation/return from leave.

Let's break it down so the board and Brown can understand why the South African public feel a bit annoyed.

• Gordhan's back... and Eskom knows itFormer finance minister Pravin Gordhan led the roasting of the Eskom board and Public Enterprises Minister Lynne Brown yesterday over the reappointment of Brian Molefe. 

Last November Molefe announced he was leaving Eskom after the public protector's brutal State of Capture report that documented the alleged close relationship between Molefe and the Gupta family and entities connected to them.

"I wish to reiterate that this act is not an admission of wrongdoing on my part. It is rather what I feel to be the correct thing to do in the interests of the company and good corporate governance," said Molefe in a statement at the time.

• He resigned. He retired. No‚ he was on unpaid leave – the desperate attempt to explain Molefe’s reinstatementGovernment‚ Eskom and the parastatal's board seem to be involved in a game of twister as they desperately try to explain away Eskom's CEO Brian Molefe's departure and now subsequent return. 

"I go now, because it is in the interests of Eskom and the public it serves that I do so."

Eskom and Brown also issued statements accepting his resignation and endorsing the interests of "good corporate governance" at play.

But now it turns out that Molefe's resignation was a fiction and that he was, instead, taking early retirement in an illegal deal which would have handed him a fat R30-million benefit.

WATCH: Resigned? Unpaid leave? Here's timeline of all things Brian Molefe

The issues of good corporate governance which were so important only a few months back are now irrelevant as Brown and Eskom twist themselves into pretzels to defend Molefe and his presumption of innocence.

To ask South Africans to swallow this revisionist history on a set of facts that are barely months old is a vulgar assault on our collective intelligence. It is also clear that we are being sold a bald-faced lie.

And that, Minister Brown, is why we are so annoyed.