This is according to ward councillor Tim Truluck, who has called on residents to become pro-actively involved in the surveillance of electricity kiosks and substations.
“When I became a councillor last year, cable theft usually only occurred beyond the western part of the ward in suburbs like Linden and Roosevelt Park,” said Truluck.
“But this year, they [cable thieves] have moved into the ward, spreading from the western suburbs of Blairgowrie and Victory Park to the central ones of Parkhurst, Parktown North and Lower Parkwood. I would expect it is only a matter of time before they reach the eastern suburbs of Rosebank and Saxonwold.”
Truluck attributed the increase in cable theft to “soaring world copper prices”, as well as a lack of security and surveillance of substations.
According to Truluck, between 2004 and 2009, the global price of copper rose by 600 percent, and cable thieves often target pipes and electrical cables, which are made from copper.
He added that thieves also vandalise substations for transformers and metal coils.
In the Johannesburg Metro’s quarterly report for July to September 2013, City Power revealed that theft and vandalism continued to be an issue, causing financial and outage problems.
Truluck has asked residents to “adopt a substation” in a bid to prevent outages caused by cable theft, and he has encouraged residents to identify the nearest electricity kiosks and substations to their homes and to walk or drive past them at least once a week.
“You are looking for broken locks, open doors, evidence of habitation by vagrants, overgrown foliage, damaged boundary fences and gates, structural cracks or damage to the walls or roof, rotten woodwork and bees that often build their hives inside the structures,” he said.
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