Infrastructure and engineering portfolio head Mongameli Bobani has lambasted vandalism and theft at water stations, saying the criminal acts affect water supply and cause the frequent water outages.
Bobani was speaking on Wednesday at the Motherwell booster pump station — which is similar to the station where repair work has recently been completed after vandalism incidents that caused water outages.
The latest incident at the Stanford Road booster pump station cost the municipality more than R1m.
He said offenders should face the full wrath of the law because vandalism resulted in water supply being shut off entirely to parts of the city to institute repairs, leaving residents without access for several hours or even days.
“We need to protect this most important commodity, our problem are these criminals.
“If they continue to do that the most marginalised people in society will suffer, including them.
“How can you steal something that helps you live, we really appeal to everyone to protect and guard this infrastructure, we all need it,” he said.
Vandalism of reservoir control infrastructure has resulted in overflowing of reservoirs and loss of water while electrical cables theft from pump stations compromises the distribution of water to where it was required.
Nelson Mandela Bay senior director for water and sanitation Barry Martin said vandalism was an ongoing problem. The total cost of the latest damage was R1m which included electrical cables and a battery.
He said often in these cases the value of the cable and materials was not the expensive part but rather, fault finding, assessment and reinstalling was time consuming and costly.
Martin said 24-hour security was needed at pump stations and the water division was continuously researching alternatives and solutions.
On the issue of security, municipal water distribution director Joseph Tsatsire said: “We have high walls and electric fencing all in the effort of trying to protect the infrastructure and ensure there is continued supply of water.
“We also have an on-site security guard but still criminals managed to get in and instruments are vandalised and instruments stolen.”
Vandalism of water infrastructure condemned
Image: WERNER HILLS
Infrastructure and engineering portfolio head Mongameli Bobani has lambasted vandalism and theft at water stations, saying the criminal acts affect water supply and cause the frequent water outages.
Bobani was speaking on Wednesday at the Motherwell booster pump station — which is similar to the station where repair work has recently been completed after vandalism incidents that caused water outages.
The latest incident at the Stanford Road booster pump station cost the municipality more than R1m.
He said offenders should face the full wrath of the law because vandalism resulted in water supply being shut off entirely to parts of the city to institute repairs, leaving residents without access for several hours or even days.
“We need to protect this most important commodity, our problem are these criminals.
“If they continue to do that the most marginalised people in society will suffer, including them.
“How can you steal something that helps you live, we really appeal to everyone to protect and guard this infrastructure, we all need it,” he said.
Vandalism of reservoir control infrastructure has resulted in overflowing of reservoirs and loss of water while electrical cables theft from pump stations compromises the distribution of water to where it was required.
Nelson Mandela Bay senior director for water and sanitation Barry Martin said vandalism was an ongoing problem. The total cost of the latest damage was R1m which included electrical cables and a battery.
He said often in these cases the value of the cable and materials was not the expensive part but rather, fault finding, assessment and reinstalling was time consuming and costly.
Martin said 24-hour security was needed at pump stations and the water division was continuously researching alternatives and solutions.
On the issue of security, municipal water distribution director Joseph Tsatsire said: “We have high walls and electric fencing all in the effort of trying to protect the infrastructure and ensure there is continued supply of water.
“We also have an on-site security guard but still criminals managed to get in and instruments are vandalised and instruments stolen.”
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