Communities across Nelson Mandela Bay are confronted with a devastating challenge that is tearing other metropolitan municipalities — particularly the City of Johannesburg and the City of Tshwane — asunder.
Over the past few years, incidents of vandalism and theft of public infrastructure have been growing in South African municipalities, particularly metros.
Key service delivery infrastructure such as electricity substations and networks, water treatment facilities, sports venues and municipal buildings, are being targeted by criminal syndicates.
Theft and vandalism of electrical infrastructure, which includes transformers and cables, cost Eskom about R221m in the year-to-date period leading up to February 2025.
The estimated annual cost of copper theft alone to the South African economy is between R5bn and R7bn, with total infrastructure theft across state-owned entities costing up to R100bn annually in direct and indirect losses.
Water infrastructure theft and vandalism also cost SA millions of rand annually, with direct replacement costs being significant and indirect costs from service disruptions and health risks adding to the burden.
Recent data shows that the City of Cape Town incurred more than R15.3m in costs for the 2024/2025 financial year, while the City of Johannesburg spends more than R50m annually to replace stolen or vandalised items such as manhole covers, water meters, pipes and pumps.
The impact of the theft and vandalism of public infrastructure has been well documented.
Beyond direct replacement, this has broader economic and social impacts.
Theft and damage disrupt essential water, sanitation and electricity services, impacting business and household operations, public health, safety, schooling and many other areas of everyday life.
The resultant financial strain is also concerning as public funds are diverted from service improvements to repairs, which creates a cycle of ongoing costs and delays in addressing the country’s growing infrastructure needs.
In the discourse around public infrastructure theft and vandalism, a deeply concerning pattern is not being highlighted — that the syndicates committing these crimes are using desperate young and unemployed men as their runners.
Just a few weeks ago, during a routine patrol along Burman Road in Gqeberha, law enforcement officers observed two men allegedly attempting to remove an electricity pole.
When they turned back to investigate, they saw the suspects, aged 25 and 26, allegedly carrying the pole down the street.
In September 2025, Transnet announced the nationwide arrest of 17 suspects in separate incidents of theft and vandalism of essential infrastructure across its network.
A significant number of the alleged perpetrators were young men.
The age profile of public infrastructure criminals is common across many other parts of the country.
Young men are increasingly being recruited by syndicates.
The implications of this are deeply troubling, for SA has seen the consequences of young people being used as runners by criminal syndicates in the recruitment of young men into drug gangs and cartels on the Cape Flats.
It begins as voluntary, with the young men themselves opting for a life of crime, mainly due to economic hardship and lack of opportunities to better their lives.
But the situation escalates into forced participation as we see in drug gangs on the Cape Flats, with young boys being threatened and intimidated to participate, or at times doing so for protection as warring factions of criminal enterprises inevitably take root.
Failing to focus on the demographic profile aspect of public infrastructure theft and vandalism is problematic because it will result in punitive rather than preventative approaches.
This is evidenced in the recent statement by the Bay municipality in which the rising number of arrests of criminals stealing public infrastructure was applauded.
And while criminality must be punished, it is even more important that it is prevented, especially where young people are concerned.
The future of our country depends not on the construction of more prisons, but on creating an economic, social and political environment in which young men do not see being part of criminal syndicates as a solution.
The Herald
