Pretoria - Residents in Capital Park have expressed concern and frustration about cable theft in the area, after at least 17 cases were reported at the local police station in September alone.
This emerged during a recent community meeting in the suburb, where the municipality met with residents, the local policing forum, ward councillors and private security companies.
The MMC for community safety, Grandi Theunissen, said all stakeholders engaged on security and safety matters, with calls on residents to report suspicious activities around municipal infrastructure.
One of the burning issues in the meeting was cable theft. Theunissen said the engagement on cable theft was prompted by at least 17 cases reported at the local police station in September.
“While there was a decline in cable theft in October 2022, with only 10 cases registered in the area, each occurrence of cable theft has a negative impact on the community and requires that we all work together to end this,” he said.
According to him, the community was generally positive about the work of the Tshwane metro police’s Cable Theft Unit (CTU) in fighting the problem. He said shortcomings were identified, including the community’s frustrations with the seemingly uncontrolled regulation of scrap metal. There was concern that this led to the illicit trade in stolen cables.
Theunissen said: “It must be noted that the mandate to fight this type of crime is primarily with the SAPS. This also applies to the granting of licences to scrap metal dealers. Nonetheless, the CTU will continue to fight this within the budgetary and manpower constraints. In this regard, we are also in the process of assigning more officials to the unit.”
Suspicious behaviour can be reported to the SAPS on 10111 or the CTU on 012 358 1550.
Pretoria News