City Power denounces violent attack on its Alexandra contactors

JOHANNESBURG - City Power has condemned the violent attack on its contractors in Alexandra, Johannesburg, after an angry mob pelted their vehicles with rocks while working in the area.

On Tuesday, angry community members demonstrated their frustrations over a lack of electricity by targeting the utility’s workers who were at the time repairing a faulty cable.

One of the technicians was hospitalised with serious injuries following the ordeal.

The latest blow for City Power comes as the utility experiences capacity issues to its systems.

As a result, several of its external contractors have been roped in to assist and fill in the gaps.

The utility said it was forced to immediately pull all its resources following the attack.

It warned that if incidents of this nature persist, it would be forced to withdraw its services from the area.

"We really, strongly condemn these violent attacks on our contractors and technicians who are assigned to address the very same outage concerns the residents are concerned about," said spokesperson Isaac Mangena.

In February, a City Power employee was allegedly hijacked in Lenesia while busy on site. He was found unharmed but had to receive trauma counselling.