CITY Power has welcomed the arrest of two contractors who allegedly stole copper cables.
The theft left residents of Naturena, Joburg, and surrounding areas without electricity for a prolonged period of time.
City Power spokesman Isaac Mangena said the pair was caught on Friday night, 17 February in possession of a 10-metre cable.
ALSO READ: Corrupt cops jailed for 15 years!
He said the two were employees of contractors hired to repair the Eikenhof line after an earlier cable theft.
Mangena said information was received that while working, the two employees allegedly cut and stole a copper cable from a trench.
“Upon further investigation, it was discovered that more cable had already been stolen and sold when
the arrests were made,” he said.
Mangena said the suspects were taken to Mondeor Police Station and charged with theft of critical infrastructure.
“These arrests are significant for City Power because they show the additional security measures that we have put in place are beginning to bear fruit,” he said.
“We will intensify the screening of the contractors working on our network and increase surveillance to ensure we curb this problem.”
Mangena said after spending days in the dark, residents of Naturena marched to their depot demanding that power be restored. He said this prolonged outage was as a result of multiple cable thefts by heavily armed criminals around the Eikenhof area, which also affected power supply to Joburg Prison.
You must be SIGNED IN to read comments".
“City Power will now move with speed to restore power to the rest of the affected areas,” Mangena said.
City Power CEO Tshifularo Mashava commended the work of the utility’s security personnel and the swift response by law enforcement officials.
“We have never ruled out the involvement of internal people in some of the theft. That’s why we have
strengthened internal controls to ensure that we bring to book all those implicated,” she said.
