Durban - More than 40 000 street light poles were vandalised or stolen in the eThekwini Municipality between July 2021 and February 2022.
Deputy mayor Philani Mavundla laid bare the impact of vandalism on the city’s infrastructure during a full council meeting in Durban this week.
DA exco member councillor Yogis Govender said the municipality was experiencing debilitating interruptions in service delivery, which appeared to be worsening each month.
“While infrastructure is old and failing a considerable amount of infrastructure has been damaged by serious sinister criminal acts under the broad ambit of vandalism.”
Govender said sub-stations, reservoirs, wastewater pump stations and street lights had been impacted.
She said sub-stations had been stripped and burnt, reservoirs had had cables and air valves stolen, panels burnt out, and there were repeated bursts on main lines.
“Sewage pump stations have been vandalised and pumps stolen while street light poles and cables are continuously stolen,” Govender said.
She requested statistics from the eThekwini Water Services and whether or not the city manager had commissioned an investigation into the increase of acts of vandalism.
Mavundla said there was a partnership between the SAPS and metro police to dismantle a syndicate that was trading in metals that were stripped from the city's infrastructure.
Mavundla said this partnership had yielded some positive results, leading to the arrest and successful conviction of perpetrators.
“New forms of engineering designs have been implemented to protect our infrastructure from vandalism … The process will be concluded by end of June 2022,” Mavundla said, adding that unit heads were finalising a report to the mayor or city manager on the number of incidents of vandalism, theft and malicious damage to property.
Govender asked if the incidents were reported to the SAPS.
Mavundla said the city’s approach was to address this through the State Security Agency (SSA), hence the incidents were not reported to the SAPS.
Between July 2021 and February 2022, 13 pump stations and 18 reservoirs had been vandalised; 15 sub-stations had been vandalised, stripped, or burnt; about120km of cables had been stolen; 29 air valves had been stolen, 17 being reticulation lines and 12 being bulk lines.
The city reported 216 water meters had been vandalised or stolen. “It will cost the city approximately R40 million to repair or replace infrastructure which was vandalised.”
Govender also asked if the city had a rapid response team to deal with illegal connections.
Mavundla said the unit was acquiring a rapid response team to assist the internal team. “In the current financial year, 47 cases are in court process, some from 2019.”
Daily News