By Jonk wa Mashamba
news@alexreporter.co.za
City Power has expressed concern about continued attacks against its technicians in Alexandra.
The power utility said it has recently seen a spike in attacks that includes robberies at gun point and assaults.
It says some attacks are suspected to be linked to the recent crime wave in the township.
Isaac Mangena, City Power spokesperson said: “Among the incidents include the one where our contractors were robbed at gunpoint on the 1st of July 2022 at around 11:00 am.
“The contractor was working at 9th Avenue between Joe Nhlahla and Hoffmeyer streets.The team’s cell phones were taken from them at gun point.
“The community intervened and the stolen property was returned later. The suspects escaped.”
Mangena said that an attempted robbery occurred on the same day at 60-10th Alexandra Avenue recently.
“Our contractor was pointed with a fire arm during the work, but fortunately their belongings were not taken.
“In another incident which happened on July 16 at around 15:00, the contractor was busy working on site when few of the community members came and forcefully took away their step ladder. This meant the work had to stop.”
He said earlier this year, on March 15, City Power teams were robbed of their phones at gunpoint around 4th Avenue no. 36.
“On May 11th our teams were hijacked and robbed of phones at Far Eastbank.
“The bakkie was later found same day by the police, but the phones and cables were never recovered.
“These incidents make it difficult for City Power to effectively service the community, and prolongs some of the outages unnecessarily.
” We have already decided against responding to outage calls from certain areas at night due to the threats and safety concerns for our workers,” said Mangena.
Mangena said they would not hesitate to pull out their teams completely if the threats increased.
He stated that it would be difficult and costly for City Power to deploy security at each outage it responds to.
“We appeal to the community to desist from threatening our workers and, if anything, to support and protect them.
“We appeal to the SAPS to ensure enough visibility which will deter criminals, and they should ensure those who commit such crimes are arrested and prosecuted.”
Pics supplied
City power officials should be accompanied by SAPS.