Fight against cable theft intensifies
Security has been beefed up to fight cable theft in the City.
City Power acting CEO Tshifularo Mashava has commended the collaborative work between City Power security, law enforcement agencies, and the community formations for the recent successes in the fight against cable theft and vandalism.
Just this past week, at least 20 suspects were arrested in different areas across the City of Joburg for cable theft.
Isaac Mangena, City Power spokesperson, said the suspects were arrested from the night of April 19 to 23, making this week unprecedented in terms of the arrests.
“The arrests come as a result of our concerted efforts with various stakeholders and the community at large. In the first incident, nine suspects were apprehended on April 19 evening by community members in Eldorado Park. The heavily armed suspects between the ages of 20 and 25 allegedly shot at the members of the community who had spotted the suspects while they were digging copper cables in the Bushkoppies area. The community successfully arrested the group of men and they were handed over to Eldorado Park SAPS.
“In a separate incident on the following evening, two suspects were found cutting cable copper cables along Vickers Road, City Deep. The suspects were immediately arrested and taken to Moffat View Police Station. They were found in possession of a side cutter, bolt cutter, knife and razor knife.
“On April 23 an arrest was made again in Eldorado Park. The area has been identified as a cable theft hotspot. In this incident, three suspects were arrested on Concorde Road along N12. The suspects were found burning and skinning 7m of 300mm x 3 core aluminium cable valued at about R5 000. The suspects were detained at Eldorado Park Police Station.
“Another incident ensued at a different location and six suspects were arrested. Four of them were cable thieves and the other two were security officers guarding an Edcon Group facility. The four were arrested at Treu Road, Selby and they were in possession of 4m of 185 x 3 core copper cables.
The suspects were taken to Johannesburg Central Police Station. A preliminary investigation led to the arrest of the two security officers. The four suspects initially arrested stated during questioning that the security officers assist them by opening the gate of the premises to dig and steal the cables and subsequently receive a share of the proceeds of crime for their efforts,” explained Mangena.
Mashava said, “The spate of cable theft and vandalism has severely affected City Power and City of Johannesburg residents alike as the incidents are major contributing factors to most of the recent outages. As part of the turnaround security strategy, City Power has contracted and beefed up armed response tasked with increasing visible patrols along our electricity installations.
“City Power embarked on a drive to collaborate with CPF and other community-based structures to protect the network. Collaborative partnerships with communities, sector policing forums, neighbourhood watch, private security sector and law-enforcement agencies are the only sustainable solution to protect our electricity network infrastructure. We cannot afford to lose this fight.”
City Power will support the investigation processes by providing identification and damage assessment statements. They will also continue to assist the prosecutorial processes through court testimonies.
These arrests are a testimony that partnerships with communities work and they will help reduce the scourge of cable theft and vandalism in the City and the country as a whole as cable theft now affects the whole of South Africa.
City Power plans to have cable theft reduced by at least 20% this year, and we are seeing the results.
“We will continue to work with law enforcement agencies and the communities in terms of developing strategies and synergy in dealing with the impact of cable theft.
“We continue to urge residents to protect essential electricity infrastructure in their communities. Residents can report suspicious behaviour on the network to City Power’s Security Control on 011 490 7900/7911/7553 or send a WhatsApp message to 083 579 4497 or contact their local law enforcement,” noted Mangena.
