Eskom technicians removing an illegally installed transformer in Lion Park outside Pietermaritzburg on Wednesday.
Eskom was welcomed with debris, including burning tyres, broken bottles, and huge tree branches, blocking the MR477 road as it moved with the police to Lion Park outside Pietermaritzburg to disconnect illegally connected electricity on Wednesday morning.
The state-owned power utility, which received a disconnection order from the Pietermaritzburg High Court, was accompanied by heavily armed police and private security officers in an operation to remove transformers and cables that the community used to steal electricity worth about R14 million per year.
Some residents, who woke up in the early hours of the morning to prevent the operation, claimed that police fired rubber bullets at them as they were protesting.
The operation started with a technical briefing between Eskom and the police at the utility’s offices in Mkhondeni before the convoy of vehicles, including police and Eskom trucks, proceeded to the disconnection scene.
