Vandalism and theft of equipment leaves residents in a dark state


By Neo Poho

The residents and businesses of Rooderpoort, west of Johannesburg have been without power due to vandalism and theft of infrastructure in the past month.

Welding-Alloys South Africa, a manufacturing company that has had to resort to generators for three weeks at immense cost is one of the companies that has suffered the most as City Power has not been able to restore a transformer that was vandalised due to running low on stock because of high cases of theft in the region.

City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena stated that in the past months about 100 mini-substations were vandalised, cables and electric fuses stolen, which led to widespread outages in and around Roodepoort. 

"The latest incident was the vandalism beyond repair of the Progress Road, Lindhaven mini-substation on Monday the 29th of May 2023.

Infrastructure crimes such as theft and vandalism have an adverse impact on supply to our customers and such incidents seem to be on the rise as we approach winter,” Mangena said.

While the rate of theft and vandalism in the region is on the rise, Mangena furthermore alluded that the entity replaced seven mini-substations in the past two weeks in Wilropark, Fleurhof, Allen’s Nek, Groblerpark and Ruimsig while each mini-substation costs approximately R800 000.

“Infrastructure crimes such as theft and vandalism have an adverse impact on supply to our customers and such incidents seem to be on the rise as we approach winter.

Therefore City Power is encouraging the community to take charge of the infrastructure through the community partnership programme on security of electricity and network infrastructure," Mangena added.

City Power will be more concerned about the state of theft and vandalism of electricity transformers as the winter season gains its momentum in the next coming weeks.

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City Power

Electricity Transformer

Power Station

Issac Mangena

Vandalism

Theft

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