Hijackers target ELM staff and vehicles
Hijackers are targeting ELM vehicles and service providers - leaving one senior manager shot and seriously wounded - in a dramatic crime spike with at least six incidents over the past week.
Senior ELM manager Bayas Ntombela was recently shot and seriously wounded in his home by hijackers who took a vehicle – and two other ELM vehicles were also hijacked, said Municipal Manager Lucky Leseane.
Ntombela, who is still in hospital, works in the Municipal Manager’s office as Head of Monitoring and Evaluation.
If allowed to continue unopposed the crime spike is seen as a serious threat to ELM service delivery and the Vaal River sewage pollution intervention project run by Rand Water – raising the possibility of serious infrastructure collapse over the coming Festive Season throughout the region.
Leseane has now called for a major intervention programme – including intelligence and camera surveillance – by the community and business sector to confront the violent surge head-on.
“A serious and growing threat has emerged not only to ELM personnel and service delivery, but also to the entire community – I am appealing to all stakeholders for help in defeating this growing menace,” said Leseane.
Leseane , who said he had already started engaging with stakeholders, added the crucial focus areas were Intelligence and camera surveillance to form defences against crime but also to provide the basis for trike-back against syndicates.
Intelligence and security experts said it was clear the Vaal faced a serous emerging threat at present – aimed at gaining cash, firearms and vehicles to drive even further attacks.
And the criminal syndicates were clearly intelligence-driven unlike official and formal responses by the State and municipalities who seemed only interested in static security contracts and not intelligence-driven operations.
“Hijackings and similar attacks seem to be going viral in the Vaal in recent weeks,” said one expert.
If allowed to continue unopposed the crime spike is seen as a serious threat to ELM service delivery, the Vaal River sewage pollution intervention project run by Rand Water and raises the possibility of serious infrastructure collapse over the coming Festive Season.
The latest modus operandi of the gang or gangs involved is to target ELM vehicles and municipality service providers such as smart meter BXC to infiltrate into homes and businesses.
BXC reported three attempts to infiltrate its operations by a gang last week which attempted to gain access to homes by pretending to be smart meter personnel.
