Enoch Mgijima municipality clamps down on meter tampering

The Enoch Mgijima Local Municipality has intensified efforts to addresselectricitymeter tampering and illegal connections to the municipal power grid. Municipal spokesperson Lonwabo Kowa said operations began in the Ezibeleni township in Komani on Monday and would continue. “There are smart meters that were installed in 2025 and 2026.

Ezibeleni happens to be one of the areas that had the smart meters installed,” he said. “The good thing about the smart meters is that they report whenever there is any ‘work’ on the system and our teams have now responded.” Kowa said the current focus was on Ezibeleni, though a few cases were also being investigated in Komani’s Mlungisi township. “This [meter tampering] has an adverse impact on municipal revenue, which leads to poor delivery of services, more particularly the electricity service,” he said.

He said no arrests had been made at this stage, but criminal charges against anyone found tampering with municipal infrastructure remained a possibility. “Meters and cables connecting those homes have been removed until offenders pay fines for their transgressions or enter into a payment agreement with the municipality,” Kowa said. According to municipal records, about 42 households in Ezibeleni had allegedly tampered with their electricity meters.

[paywall]

Kowa said further investigations would be conducted as the municipality suspected that an individual or contractor had been moving from house to house offering meter tampering services. He said in one street in Ezibeleni alone, at least 10 houses had allegedly been found with tampered meters. Though Kowa could not provide figures for the municipality’s annual losses linked to electricity theft, it has been estimated that municipalities and Eskom lose more than R30bn in potential revenue annually due to illegal connections, bridged meters and ghost vending.

[/paywall]