Vandals steal city street lights batteries

Vandals have stolen at least 100 batteries installed to power the city streets solar lighting system, plunging the World Bank-funded project into problems.

Surprisingly, both the City Hall and police, who have separate sets of Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) covering the city, including some of the areas where the batteries were plucked off, are unable to produce footage that would reveal faces of the thiefs.

The solar street lights project is being implemented by Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) to light up dark spots that criminals exploit to target their victims and also beautify the country’s capital.

Daily Monitor has established that while KCCA has installed solar lights on some city streets in the past three years, some of the batteries that power the solar panels to emit light have since been stolen by unknown people.

This trend of vandalism has not only caused financial loss to the city authority but also worsened the city’s darkness.
The solar street lights were installed under the second phase of Kampala Institutional and Infrastructural Development Project (KIIDP-2) funded by World Bank.

The affected areas include Fairway Junction, traffic signal junctions on the stretch between Kabira Country Club and Kiira Road Police Station, Jinja Road (Stretch between UMI and Airtel Round about), Nile Avenue, Kawempe-Lugoba stretch, and Kibuli.
According to KCCA, at least 100 batteries have since been stolen in the last couple of months, worsening the problem.

The loss
The KCCA spokesperson, Mr Peter Kaujju, said the financial loss caused as a result of theft of 100 batteries for the solar panels is approximately Shs200m.
He also noted that the installation of one solar street light costs about Shs8m.

“The theft of these batteries have greatly affected the functionality of the solar street lights in the city despite the high value of the capital investments in the projects,” he said.
The vandalism comes at a time when the city authority is grappling with funding deficits which have seen some projects stall. This partly explains why the installation of solar lights has not been extended to most parts of the city.

Asked how the authority intends to weed out the vice, Mr Kaujju revealed that they have deployed part of the law enforcement team to partner with police and carry out night patrols.
According to the information that we have gathered, the batteries are stolen at night by unknown people, who disguise as KCCA technical staff working on faulty lights.

Police response
The Kampala Metropolitan police deputy spokesperson, Mr Luke Owoyesigyire, said police are currently investigating where the stolen batteries are sold.
However, he noted that cases of vandalism have been common in the city centre but rare in divisions.

“Members of the public should be on the lookout and immediately report whenever they see suspicious people around street lights at night because robbers have for a very long time been disguising as KCCA staff. We have also heightened our intelligence to track those criminals,” he said.
Mr Owoyesigyire revealed that police have arrested several reckless drivers who knock down poles on which solar street light panels are fitted.

Asked whether the recently installed cameras have not helped to identify the robbers, Mr Owoyesigyire referred us to KCCA, saying they have cameras around the city which are connected to their traffic control centre at City Hall.
He could not explain why the CCTV cameras, which are in the same vicinity with solar street lights, were unable to track the faces or identity of the thieves.

An official from KCCA, who preferred anonymity because he is not supposed to speak to media, said while KCCA has cameras in the city, they are installed in few strategic places such as public taxi parks, traffic lights junctions and on some streets in the city centre.

Affected city roads

JUNCTIONS. Fairway Junction, traffic signal junctions on the stretch between Kabira Country Club and Kiira Road Police Station, Jinja Road (Stretch between UMI and Airtel Round about), Nile Avenue, Kawempe-Lugoba stretch, and Kibuli.

Solar lights installation

In January last year, the Daily Monitor reported that at least 900 solar lights were procured and installed on several roads or streets in the city to end darkness the couture’s capital.

According to the KCCA budget, the solar lights on the newly constructed roads cost Shs400m. Some of the city roads with solar lights included Makerere Hill Road, Kira Road, Kampala Road, Nile Avenue, Kabaka Anjagala Road and Bakuli-Kasubi Road, Kintu Road, Bombo Road, City Square, Jinja Road, Bahai, Speke, Lugoba, Wansano, Mutundwe and Entebbe Road, among others.

However, when you either branch off the main road or street, or continue to other city suburbs, the bright lights diminish and you have to manoeuver through potholed-dark alleys or streets, causing a lot of anxiety.

Muggers and hooligans usually hide in these dimly lit places to rob unsuspecting people.
A spot-check carried out by this newspaper in all the five divisions of Kampala found out that majority of the bulbs are faulty.

For instance, some roads in the city centre with faulty street lights included Namirembe Road, Rashid Khamis Road, John Ssebaana Kizito Road, Mwanga II Road, Rubaga Road, and Gadaffi Road, all in Old Kampala.

Public places such as the Old and New Taxi parks, were found to be grappling with the same challenges, hence putting the lives of passengers at risk.

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