Detectives have intensified a crackdown on a syndicate responsible for the vandalism of electricity transformers, cables, electrical apparatus and other electricity infrastructure leading to huge losses to the government and electricity consumers.
To address the menace, a dedicated team of officers from the police is working closely with investigators based at the electricity distribution company, to stem this vice once and for all.
In an operation involving officers from the Crime Research and Intelligence Bureau and investigators based at the Kenya Power and Lighting Company, a raid was conducted at a palatial home in Mutonguni, Machakos County. Five sacks of vandalised aluminum wires were recovered.
The owner of the house who police branded a notorious suspect believed to be the leader of an elaborate syndicate of vandals who target installations along the country’s electricity lines was arrested.
According to a report from KPLC, the power distributor had recorded over 220 incidents of vandalism in the country from January to June this year, with Nairobi, Kiambu, Machakos, and Nakuru Counties accounting for over half of the reported incidents.
This resulted in frequent power blackouts that became the order of the day in the worst-hit areas, leading to losses of millions of shillings.
Last year, detectives working with KPLC-based investigators unearthed an elaborate network of third-party agents who were working with crooked former employees of the power distributor, to intentionally occasion blackouts in order to generate income through reconnection of power.
This was achieved through vandalism of crucial parts of transformers, before the agents masquerading as Kenya Power officials approached the affected area residents and reconnected power to their homesteads at a fee.
In the well-orchestrated transgression, the thugs would sabotage efforts by the KPLC to restore the power supply by removing fuses from transformers, immediately the KPLC emergency teams left the sites.
This was done in a bid to frustrate consumers further so that they would yield to their demands.
As a result, the government issued a moratorium on scrap metal dealings, after investigations revealed that the scrap metal trade was responsible for runaway vandalism of critical national infrastructure, targeting materials used for electricity connection and road and railway construction, in a vice bordering on economic sabotage.
