City Power said the vandalism of Ground Mounted Transformers (GMTs) and other key switching equipment, is now on the rise.
This follows at least four incidents of transformer vandalism in the Alexandra area, in just one month.
As a result, the power utility is calling on community, patrollers, law enforcement agencies, private security companies, and other stakeholders, to assist in curbing the increasing incidents of vandalism in Lombardy East and parts of Alexandra.
Tshifularo Mashava, CEO of City Power, said these acts of sabotage have resulted in widespread and prolonged power outages.
Each transformer costs between R800 000 to R1.2 million to replace, excluding labour and installation costs.
In the past two weeks, residents of Lombardy East had no electricity, as well as those supplied by the Gresswold Substation -Hennie, Byron, Victoria, and Wellington Road, due to a burnt main circuit breaker, which was the result of vandalism.
City Power said its teams are working around the clock, to finalise repairs and restore supply as soon as possible.
City Power operates a network stretching around 20,000km across the City of Johannesburg, which requires round-the-clock monitoring and protection.
“We will not tolerate anyone within our midst involved in these criminal acts and undoing the progress we are making in improving the quality of services” said Mashava.