IZINYOKA in zones 5 and 8 in Seshego outside Polokwane, Limpopo are making life difficult for the people.
And it’s all because of load shedding.
They wait for load shedding to kick in at night and then steal electricity cables.
Residents now fear that izinyoka will start breaking into their homes once they are done stealing cables. Eddie Chuene (36) said it seems izinyoka target areas that are affected by load shedding at night.
“We are now living in fear because of these thugs. Load shedding is making it easy for them to steal because they know there are zero chances of being electrocuted,” he said.
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Other residents said they spend days in the dark as the Polokwane Municipality takes time to replace the cables.
“This is useless because even when the municipality replaces the cables, izinyoka come back and steal them again,” said Hazel Monaiwa (41).
The gatvol residents have now resolved to patrol their areas at night.
Khutso Moetsi (29) said: “Let’s all make sure every household has a whistle and torch. We can’t continue living like this. We spend days without electricity and our food gets rotten in our fridges.
“We can’t afford to buy takeaway food because of izinyoka.”
This situation costs the municipality more than R10 million each year due to vandalism of infrastructure as street lights, transformers, mini substations and cables are either being vandalised or stolen at a large scale.
Municipal spokesman Thipa Selala said they were aware of incidents of cable theft.
“We have put measures to fight these incidents of cable theft. However, the community can help protect the assets of the municipality which in the end belongs to them,” he said.
