By Larry Claasen
THE appointment of a new security provider has resulted in a huge drop in theft and vandalism on Transnet’s rail network in the Western Cape.
Before this company was appointed, Transnet experienced several criminal incidents a day, but now it is down to a handful a week.
“We are coming from an era where we had three to four incidents of cable theft and vandalism a day, but now, we only have two a week,” said Transnet Freight Rail head of operations, Smangele “Smah” Khumalo at a presentation to the Western Cape Parliament.
“One of the major issues we are faced with is security incidents. We have had a number of cable thefts, especially between Belville and Beaufort West,” she said.
The impact of these thefts contributed to the delays experienced at the Port of Cape Town.
The cost of cable theft has been enormous to Transnet. The transport parastatal told City Press in December that it had spent R290-million to replace and fix stolen and vandalised cables in an 18-month period. Transnet Freight Rail had 2 731 cable theft incidents, with 668km of cables stolen in the six months to end of October 2023.
Khumalo did not name the security provider but said its success was based on a combination of intelligence and technology.
The provider has had an enormous impact, leading to an improvement in Transnet’s operations and a blow to those responsible for theft and vandalism.
“Outcome-based security had yielded quite positive results in the Western Cape and had also led to arrests and conviction, which is something we never used to have.”
According to the presentation provided to the Western Cape Parliament, the number of criminal incidents had fallen from 37 in November to 20 in January.
Better coordination on the way
Though Khumalo says the reduction in criminal activity is impressive, Transnet and the service provider are working to reduce it further.
This will see them set up a Joint Corridor Command Centre, which will enable real-time monitoring and to enable quicker response times to security incidents.
Aside from setting up the Joint Corridor Command Centre, Khumalo says Transnet and the security provider are also trying to further reduce criminal activity by determining where to deploy the technology that detects possible criminal activity on its rail network.
Despite the progress made in reducing criminal activity, she says Transnet wants to reduce it even further.
“We have not yet gotten to a stage where we are 100% satisfied.”
