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The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality has concluded a memorandum of understanding with organised business to safeguard municipal infrastructure which has become the target of vandalism.
The MOU was signed at the Ditchling Power Station in Algoa Park on Thursday between the President of the Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber, Loyiso Dotwana, and executive mayor, Nqaba Bhanga, which will enable the "Adopt-a-Substation" initiative to be implemented.
According to the NMB Chamber, this follows the Chamber's drive to assist the Municipality with the safeguarding of its critical electrical substations against widespread vandalism that has cost the city millions of rand for repairs and negatively impacted upon the continuity of business activities.
"The signing of the MOU paves the way for businesses participating in the initiative to expedite the finalisation of plans to curb the continued vandalism on the city's critical electrical infrastructure and ensure there are minimal interruptions to the power supply to business operations due to these criminal elements," said Chamber CEO Denise van Huysteen.
She said the Chamber, through its Electricity Task Team, had been engaging with the Municipality on a collaborative initiative to protect the supply of electricity to impacted businesses in the city, and now members were ready to implement this key initiative.
"Over the past year, the vandalism of sub-stations and the stealing of electricity has escalated to the extent that there are now frequent disruptions to manufacturing operations due to power outages. Not only do these actions result in millions of Rand in damage, they also cause manufacturing operations to halt, with one company recently losing 12 days of production," she said.
Van Huysteen said the next step would be for the Chamber to approach its member companies and encourage more of them to become part of the initiative by adopting a substation near their particular business precincts.
"A needs analysis of each substation will be conducted to identify the kind of security support needed to ensure its safety. Where necessary, first-line security and surveillance services, including personnel for monitoring of the latter and or boundary/perimeter fencing will be deployed to reinforce security measures."
Executive Mayor Nqaba Bhanga said the MOU signing was a good step towards creating an economically viable City.
"This partnership is the beginning of many that the City is forging with different stakeholders to make sure that Nelson Mandela Bay is a safe City of choice for economic growth,” he said.
"As the City, we do accept that we cannot overcome all our challenges on our own, strategic partnership like this is a good foundation."
