Child, 9, dies after touching exposed electricity cables in Joburg

A nine-year-old child was electrocuted as a result of illegal connections in the Rabie Ridge informal settlement in Johannesburg.  

The incident occurred last week, according to the city's MMC for environment and infrastructure services department (EISD) Mpho Moerane, who warned against the dangers of illegal connections.

“The child was electrocuted late last week after touching exposed cables running past the family shack in Ext 4, which was used to connect electricity illegally. Kananga informal settlement is one of the many hotspots in the city identified by City Power where the problem of illegal connections persists,” said Moerane.

Moerane expressed condolences to the family of the slain child as the city experienced network overloading as a result of the illegal connections.

“Illegal connections lead to overloading of the network, leading to frequent outages, as seen this past winter. Not only do illegal connections cost the city millions in lost revenue, they are a danger to the residents, especially children,” said Moerane.

Moerane said City Power would intensify the cut-off of illegal connections across the city, while continuing raising awareness  about the dangers of vandalism and illegal connections.

This as the city revealed that there  had been minimal outages in the past week, except for an outage at Cleveland substation, which took almost 12 hours to restore due to repairs on feeder boards, and cable faults.  

Lenasia also saw an increase in issues with medium voltages which were restored within the targeted time.  

“We are seeing a worrying trend of an increase in vandalism and theft of our infrastructure across the regions. Street lights seem to be the target, with some around Lenasia, and other areas mowed down in what we see as a serious crime against the state,” said Moerane.

 The city called on law-enforcement agencies to assist in ensuring that the perpetrators are found and brought to book.

“We also appeal to the communities to report any acts of vandalism they witness around their areas to the police.”

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