Blue lights to keep your lights on: When service delivery only happens under security escort

Routine municipal maintenance across Johannesburg has increasingly turned into a high-risk security operation, with frontline technicians needing armed police escorts simply to repair power lines, fix leaking pipes, or clear refuse in volatile neighbourhoods.

The severity of the threat facing municipal service providers was laid bare on Monday, 12 October, when a City Power technical team attending to low-voltage outages in Riverlea was hijacked and held up at gunpoint by armed criminals who robbed workers of their personal belongings and equipment.

In the wake of the armed robbery, City Power was forced to temporarily withdraw its technicians from the area, delaying essential electricity restorations for residents.

Operations only resumed after City Power’s Security Risk Management team partnered with the Langlaagte SA Police Service (Saps) to provide armed escorts for technicians entering the suburb.

Confirming the incident, City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena said staff safety remains paramount.

“Due to safety concerns and the trauma experienced by our staff, operations in the area were temporarily suspended,” Mangena said, noting that technical crews were later able to restore electricity supply in Pongola Street under Saps protection.

“To ensure their continued safety, we have engaged Langlaagte Saps and the City Power Risk Officer to arrange security escorts for our teams until the area is declared safe for normal operations.”

Mafias

This incident is not an isolated event. Across Johannesburg, entities like City Power, Joburg Water, and Pikitup face mounting hostility from organised criminal networks.

A recent government tender notice requested bids for “tactical response services, armoured vehicles, escort services and close protection services as-and-when needed by Johannesburg Water for a period of thirty-six months”, underlying the challenges utilities face.

According to Willem Els, co-founder of the Security Initiative for Africa (SIA) and consultant for the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), the violence directed at service delivery workers stems from a combination of illegal utility connections, local extortion rings, and broader infrastructure syndicates.

Els explained that when municipal teams attempt to cut off illegal electricity connections, “they are now being disrupted by these people.” In other instances, organised groups seek total control over specific neighbourhoods.

“You have some criminal gangs that are really into extortion, taking control of the area,” Els said, explaining that these groups often demand payment before allowing municipal work to proceed.

Els noted that this criminal economy also extends to the water sector, where the “water mafia” manipulates pipeline access to force municipalities to rely on private water tankers.

Syndicates also frequently target construction and maintenance contracts, demanding a “30% cut” in exchange for protection.

Els explained that syndicates keep attacking until contractors and service providers agree to pay an “extortion fee… for protection”.

When asked why frontline technicians have become soft targets, Els pointed to a systemic breakdown in criminal justice deterrence, noting that fewer than 12% of recorded crimes lead to conviction.

“They lost their fear of retribution, because they know the ability of the government is not there to successfully arrest, investigate, and prosecute them,” Els said.

National failure hampering local growth

The need for police escorts to deliver basic services highlights a deeper structural problem: the national security apparatus’s failure to maintain a safe operating environment for local government.

Political analyst Daniel Silke explained that local municipalities are bearing the direct financial and operational costs of broader law enforcement failures.

“The failure of the broader security apparatus and the failure of the state to secure the safety of municipal workers is a deep cost to municipalities,” Silke said.

“It adds to the long list of national or state failures that impact on local service delivery.”

Silke emphasised that local government issues cannot be separated from broader state security performance.

“You can’t just discuss local government efficiencies without also making sure that the same efficiencies are pressured at a national level,” he noted.

What political parties are saying

With local government elections approaching, the issue of policing and service delivery security has become a key political battleground, exposing fundamental differences in party philosophy.

“The DA’s philosophy has always been to decentralise, take away power from the central government and devolve it down to local level,” Silke said, pointing to Cape Town where the party champions localised policing powers.

In contrast, Silke noted that parties like the ANC, EFF, and MK Party historically prefer “national or greater state control, or state intervention rather than giving power down to sort of local authorities.”

However, he added that the ANC is slowly realising that giving local authorities more power over key issues like security could ultimately be beneficial.

Finding sustainable solutions

While police escorts provide temporary protection for technicians, experts agree that armed security is not a sustainable long-term solution to service delivery disruption.

Els emphasised that tackling violence against municipal crews requires a holistic, community-centred approach rather than relying solely on police.

“These criminals are within the community, they live amongst them, and they operate there,” Els noted. “It is a matter of uniting the different communities and then standing up against the evil within themselves.”

City Power continues to urge community members to help protect vital infrastructure by reporting suspicious activity to its Security Risk Management Department or local police stations.