The GTCoC says the present security contract at ELM is “useless and not fit for purpose” regarding the highly-dangerous security situation on the ground for municipal strategic infrastructure, says Klippies Kritzinger, CEO of the GTCoC.
Kritzinger says business is extremely concerned that the present municipal security contract will be renewed at huge cost but without any improvement in the security situation where infrastructure is regularly attacked by heavily armed syndicates.
Ndlovu told Vaalweekblad this week he would seek to allay GTCoC and business fears by meeting as soon as possible to inform them of the present situation. Ndlovu said due to ELM procurement processes being reorganised, the tender process could not be concluded in time and it was thus necessary to avoid a gap in security services by doing a “diversion” contract for three months with the incumbent service provider.
This means that the present service provider will continue in place until the end of October 2021 whilst tender and adjudication processes were resolved. Kritzinger said the GTCoC welcomed engagement with Ndlovu but remained adamant that any future ELM security contract be severely reconfigured to not exploit security officers and give them the means to defend themselves against well-armed syndicates.
“The old model of deploying a few security guards at infrastructure or ELM Head Office is no longer relevant because the game has changed radically – syndicates operate often with insider ELM information and with high quality intelligence.
“The only way to fight that is to have a credible outsourced intelligence-driven service provider who can anticipate criminal moves before they happen and take pro-active action. If this does not happen then the Vaal is doomed to continuous power blackouts and cable theft with destroys business,” said Kritzinger.
