Cable theft the result of power outages and overpopulation in Mbombela
The City of Mbombela has been experiencing a lot of cable theft attempts.
Aside from constant incidents of attempted cable theft, the City of Mbombela (CoM) said power failures in West Acres are also caused by overpopulation.
The CoM spokesperson, Joseph Ngala, said load-shedding has also had a bad impact on power provision, as cable thieves take advantage of the dark, start to dig up the cables and cut them off.
“So, recently we have been experiencing a lot of cable theft attempts that cause a lot of outages because all this criminal activity happens when the power is off. Once it comes back, that is where we locate the problem,” he said.
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Ngala said the thieves know the power cut schedules and will dig up cables where the electricity is off, as they they cannot steal cables while it is on. Theft is rampant, especially during stage 6 outages.
“Once load-shedding comes to an end, we will experience less cable theft. We guard the electricity infrastructure, but we need community members to come on board. But for now, we can only plead with the communities to also safeguard the infrastructure that is servicing them.”
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He said apart from the cable theft in West Acres, the suburb is also facing overpopulation and the system is not coping.
“We are working on upgrading the system so that the problem can be resolved permanently. We ask the community to bear with us and to keep reporting faults to us.”
He said the thieves are aware that West Acres is experiencing outages more than usual and makes use of such opportunities to try and steal cables.
