Africa-Press – Angola. Defense and Security bodies in the province of Huambo dismantled, this Thursday, a network of electrical material traffickers, as part of operation Okuliandja, an expression in the national Umbundu language that means “Being at Peace”.
The operation, carried out in the Quissala market, “known as Germany”, on the outskirts of the city of Huambo, resulted in the arrest of five citizens, accused of trafficking and selling numerous quantities of electrical equipment belonging to the National Electricity Distribution Company (ENDE) .
These are unspecified quantities of LVAV class cables, multi-strand, LXS D 16, 50, 70 and 95 millimeters, in addition to hatches, circuit breakers, general low voltage switchboards, solar panels, lighting, pre-paid meters, connectors and passage clamps.
The spokesperson for SIC – Huambo, criminal investigation sub-inspector Abel Cangombe, informed that the operation took place seven days after the visit of the Minister of Energy and Water, João Baptista Borges, to the Central Plateau, which encouraged the fierce fight against vandalization of public property, especially electrical equipment.
He said it was the largest seizure of electrical equipment recorded this year in the province of Huambo.
He said that the network was detected and dismantled in the Quissala market, considered the largest open-air market in the province of Huambo, with five detained in the act, while efforts are underway to determine the others involved in the crime of trafficking and commercialization of electrical material.
Created in 2006, when Germany hosted the football world cup, in which Angola participated for the first time, the “Germany” market, with an area of 110 hectares, registers a daily movement of more than 15 thousand people, and has close to of eight thousand sellers.
ENDE officials present at the site of the seizure, pointed out the Chitutula, Kachinõle, Macolocolo, Sassonde 3 and R21 neighborhoods, both on the outskirts of the city of Huambo, as being the ones that record the most acts of vandalization of electricity equipment, especially electrical cables. , for the municipalities of Bailundo and Caála.
Inside the city of Huambo, they added, the biggest concern is the vandalization of transformation stations.
However, they assured that ENDE will comment on the quantities seized and material damage at any time.
Press found that the vandalization of energy distributors aims, fundamentally, at the extraction of copper, which is subsequently used in the manufacture of household utensils and jewelry.
Operation Okuliandja focuses on combating the vandalization of public property, violent, economic and organized crime, in order to guarantee peace and tranquility in the community in general.
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