Three suspected electricity installation vandals have been apprehended by members of a vigilante group and handed over to the police in Anambra.
The Head, Corporate Communications in Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC), Emeka Ezeh, said this in a statement on Thursday in Enugu.
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He said the vandals were apprehended while attempting to vandalise a 300KVA distribution substation of the company located at Akwa-Ukwu, Nnewi District.
Ezeh said the trio were handed over to Orba Police Division and transferred to the state Criminal Investigation Department (CID), Awka for further interrogation and prosecution.
He said the suspected vandals were handed over to the police on April 6.
He noted that activities of vandals undermine the efforts being made by the company to improve its service to customers.
“In the course of interrogation, it was gathered that the trio are suspected to have masterminded the attack on Ibollo 500KVA distribution substation at Oraifite, Anambra State, late March, 2021.
“Since the beginning of this year, the rate of vandalism across our network has been on the rise, as over 120 distribution substations have been attacked, and items worth millions of naira vandalised,’’ Ezeh said.
The EEDC spokesman said that some of the items usually vandalised include armoured cables, intermediate cables, feeder pillars units, transformer oil and bare conductors.
According to him, vandalism still remains a cog in the wheel of progress and constitutes a very big distraction to the organisation.
“We continuously channel resources ought to be used for other meaningful projects to replace vandalised items,’’ he said. (NAN)