Mnquma local municipality bosses issued a heartfelt plea to the residents of Butterworth, Ngqamakhwe and Centane this week: “Please help us fight izinyoka [cable thieves].”
Amid mounting concern about the vandalism and theft of municipal infrastructure, particularly electricity cables, yet another suspected cable thief was arrested in Butterworth on Monday.
Municipal spokesperson Loyiso Mpalantshane said on Wednesday the suspect was allegedly caught in possession of cables by a municipal task team created to deal with rampant vandalism and the destruction of electricity infrastructure.
“Last week, we had two or three suspects caught with air conditioners and cables belonging to the municipality.
“The cases were reported to the police. This has been going on for years and has now reached crisis levels,” Mpalantshane said.
“The constant power outages are a direct result of ongoing vandalism and theft of electricity infrastructure.”
Cable theft and other forms of vandalism are prevalent in the CBDs of the three Mnquma municipality towns.
In 2022, Eskom placed Mnquma in the top three municipalities with the highest number of vandalised or disused power substations in SA, Mpalantshane said.
This was after the state power utility’s senior management visited the municipality and launched several community development projects to encourage residents to be vigilant and report theft, vandalism and illegal connections.
But these crimes are still rampant today.
Mpalantshane was unable to quantify what it cost the municipality to repair damaged infrastructure, but said the situation was so bad that some substations could no longer be used to supply electricity.
“One classic example is the now redundant Ronnie Pook substation near the entrance to Msobomvu township, and another behind the Butterworth Hospital.
“Ibika was also flagged as the next endangered substation on the brink of collapse due to the high number of illegal connections.”
In one of its most successful attempts to fight the scourge, the municipality recovered stolen electricity cables from a house in the Ibika township, resulting in the owner’s arrest.
“If the government is to win the war against izinyoka and the sabotage of electricity infrastructure, communities must stand up and do their bit as well,” Mpalantshane said.
“The damage to municipal electricity infrastructure has been substantial over the years.”
The situation was affecting Mnquma’s local economy, he said.
The sabotage caused huge inconvenience to electricity consumers and badly affected the operations of many businesses which often had to shut up shop during outages because they had no generators.
Mpalantshane said officials had resolved to confiscate trolleys used mainly by young people to transport people’s groceries outside shops.
“We understand they do that to earn money to survive, but unfortunately the same trolleys are used to carry stolen goods at night.”
The municipality could not rule out the possibility of a well-co-ordinated syndicate being behind the sabotage of infrastructure.
It was also possible that drug addicts were stripping and stealing cables to feed their habit.
Mpalantshane said the municipality had decided to employ more security guards to secure infrastructure.
It was reported last week that another Eastern Cape local authority, the King Sabata Dalindyebo municipality, had spent nearly R30m in less than two years to repair damaged electricity infrastructure in and around Mthatha.
This was in addition to the municipality losing about R168m due to illegal electricity connections and meter tampering in the past five years, involving more than 12,000 households.
Daily Dispatch
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