Africa-Press – South-Africa. City Power has pulled its staff from Jeppestown in Johannesburg after a team of technicians was attacked on Sunday.
The four technicians were attending to outage calls and were connecting customers to overhead lines in Wolhuter and Auret streets when they were attacked by six people on Sunday morning, said City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena.
“The six men pointed [guns] at our technicians… and took phones and money from them. They also assaulted them, leaving one badly injured,” said Mangena.
“All this happened in full view of the community the technicians were there to assist.”
City Power decided not to finish the repairs and pulled the team out of the area “until their safety is guaranteed”, added Mangena.
He said: “We call on the police to do everything to ensure the criminals are arrested and brought to book.”
Last month, technicians were attacked in Hillbrow and Alexandra. One of the victims is still in hospital.
News24 previously reported that City Power had opened a case of attempted murder, assault and intimidation after one of its technicians, Ratsele Machethe, 53, was attacked.
He was part of a team sent to cut power to a block of flats in Wolmarans Street, Hillbrow, that owes around R5 million to the City of Johannesburg.
Machethe was hit on the head several times with a blunt object and stones.
During the Alexandra attack, technicians were hijacked while repairing an outage along 9th Avenue.
Mangena said technicians had already been pulled from outage calls at night in some hostile communities for their safety.
“We appeal to the community to stand up against the criminals who attack municipal workers as this affects service delivery in their areas. While the option of escorts remains on the table, it will be a costly and unnecessary exercise as we expect the community to cooperate with our workers serving them,” said Mangena.
For More News And Analysis About South-Africa Follow Africa-Press
