limukaniCharity Chikara
Sunday news Correspondent
Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution company vandalism perpetrators have been sentenced to a total 120 years from 12 convicted cases of theft of copper, aluminum, transformers and cables from January 2022 to date.
Following a surge of ZETDC property vandalism cases, the ZETDC has lost property worth US$ 792 332 from 332 cases as of August 2022. US$ 172 515 has been since recovered from 42 arrests and 12 convictions done so far.
According to statistical evidence availed by ZETDC, there has been a total of 256 cases of copper theft worth US$605 077 and only US$109 787 has been recovered. A total of 26 culprits were apprehended and nine have since been convicted to a 90 years and 13 days’ jail sentence.
A total of 25 transformers theft cases worth US$107 500 have been recorded and US$47 500 worth of transformers have been recovered. Only six arrests were made and the culprits have been convicted to 20 years’ in prison.
A total of nine cases of aluminum theft cases have been recorded, valued at US$6 450, and no arrests have been made. There have been 30 theft cases of cables worth US$73 295 and US$8 778 have been recovered after 10 people were arrested and one was convicted to 10 years in prison.
The pattern of the cases shows that only 12.6 percent of perpetrators are arrested and 28.6 percent have been convicted so far. Copper is seemingly the highly targeted as it constitutes 80.7 percent of the theft cases.
Speaking in an interview, Western Region General Manager, Eng. Lloyd Jaji said ZETDC and other stakeholders were lobbying the government to increase the mandatory sentence from 10 years to 30 years for those who vandalize and steal their equipment.
“We have lobbied for an increase in the sentence so that it is increased to 30 years so that it becomes deterrent. That is taking a bit of time to be effected, if the sentence had been increased to 30 years, I am sure the cases would be slowly decreasing,” he said.
Electricity touches all sectors of the economy including education, health and business. It supports different industries including technology. Furthermore, with the Government’s thrust of becoming a middle income economy by 2030, electricity cannot be eliminated from the equation of that dream.
Online Reporter