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17.04.2015 General News

Copper Stealing Syndicate Vandalize Jimi Station

17.04.2015 LISTEN
By Name Nana Kwasi Amoah

Renegade cable thieves who have been vandalizing electric poles in the Obuasi municipality for some time are up again disrupting the orderly flow of water to hundreds of people.

As a result, water cannot be pumped from the Jimiso Dam several communities and businesses which depend on the dam for power and water.

'The privilege of having water all year round has been dashed as we have to walk some distance before we get alternative source of water when the Jimiso River is disturbed by these criminals',

Soumah Andah, a farmer at Jimiso community said.
AngloGold Ashanti sources confirmed that as many as 30 poles have been vandalized within a forthright and thousands of meters of copper cables from the mine to Jimiso, a farming community where the pumping dam is located. have been stolen for the past 2weeks. Scores of headdresses, food vendors, wielders and chemical shops, which depend on power for their business have been forced to shut down.

Worse affected is the Edwin Arthur Cade Hospital, the mine hospital, which serves hundreds of employees and patients from the communities on daily basis. It has has being experiencing water shortages because of vandalisation.' We need water badly to work, to deliver health care to the public but our efforts here are being undermined as we are not getting the right quantity of water', Richard Cromwell, the hospital manager said. Other medical facilities in the Obuasi Township, which depend on the Jimiso Dam have also being complaining bitterly.

' We cannot talk about the exact cost of these heinous activities now but it will run into several thousands of dollars', an AngloGold Ashanti technician working at Jimiso said.

A grown up farmer in one of the adjoining communities said. 'We are under siege from these few criminals who are thinking unfortunately about what they will eat today. It is possible that the culprits are within the communities but the law abiding members of the communities are afraid to talk. They know the cable thieves'. The thieves have been vandalizing the cables for some time and the inability of the Obuasi and Amakyem police to arrest them seem to have spurred them to cut more'

The poles and the copper cables as well as the dam were put up by the AngloGold Ashanti, about forty years at a huge cost - to pump adequate water from the Jimi Dam to ensure all year round water supply to the communities and employees on the mine.

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