Pretoria North CPF vows to work with private security company to safeguard electricity infrastructure
Despite CPF measures such as greasing street poles to prevent cable thieves from climbing up them, there have still been many attempts of theft.
The Pretoria North sector 1 and 2 CPF will work closely with a private security company to safeguard electricity infrastructure following multiple attacks.
Sector 1 Chairman Jan White said steps were being taken in response to the increasing number of cable thefts, which brings darkness to Pretoria North.
White said the CPF was concerned about the rise in vandalism and theft of cables and equipment, and the impact it had on residents and businesses.
“This partnership is hoped to deter criminals and protect the community.”
He said these efforts aimed to intensify the CPF patrols.
“We will try to do more patrols as much as possible,” said White.
White said despite the use of measures such as greasing street poles to prevent cable thieves from climbing up them, there have still been many theft attempts.
“We did put grease on most of the poles but they keep on cutting the cables as the thieves work in teams.”
White said there has been more than four cases of theft in the past two weeks.
He urged the community to continue assisting them with information regarding all cable theft via community WhatsApp groups that can be used to report suspicious activities.
According to the Tshwane metro, replacing stolen cables and other electrical components was very costly.
“Our budget constraints pose a significant challenge to available resources,” said metro spokesperson Lindela Mashigo.
“Cable theft is draining the city’s already-drained pockets.
“It hampers service delivery to customers, as it results in power supply interruptions,” said Mashigo.
“While the City strives to repair the problem within a strict timeframe, it means resources aimed at other service delivery aspects have to be compromised.”
Tshwane finance MMC Peter Sutton previously warned that anyone found to have connected electricity illegally or to have tampered with infrastructure would be fined.
Sutton said electricity theft was costing the metro an estimated R470-million per year.
“This is money taken away from service delivery by individuals and business owners in Tshwane through pure arrogance and entitlement,” he said.
Previously, anyone caught with illegal connections would have been fined around R600 000.
“We have increased the fines for illegal connections and electricity theft to R10-million for business accounts. Individual or household accounts are only fined R200 000.”
Sutton said the metro would also look into laying criminal charges to pursue lost revenue.
“We will establish a highly skilled multidisciplinary revenue collection team for this purpose, to which we allocated R68-million in the budget.
“If you are an individual and/or business owner involved in electricity theft and tampering with prepaid meters, you should be very concerned,” he warned.
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