BusinessLive reports that Eskom has expressed concern about incidents in which its offices were blockaded and employees were intimidated and assaulted.  

In some instances they were held hostage by community members.  The power utility reported that there were violent protests at its offices in Braamfischer and Klipsruit in Soweto, Ivory Park, Orange Farm and Winterveldt last week.  Vandalisation of Eskom infrastructure was also a problem.  Eskom's operations and maintenance manager Motlhabane Ramashi said Eskom employees were frequently harassed and intimidated while driving or attending to problems.  He indicated that as a result of these incidents, Eskom was not in a position to continuously replace mini-stations and pole-mounted transformers in areas where residents were not paying for electricity and had bypassed their meters and had illegally connected themselves to the network.  Ramashi added that the extreme measure of withdrawing services in those areas was temporarily implemented to protect employees until the areas were declared safe for operations.

• Read the full original of Ernest Mabuza’s report on this story at BusinessLive

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