Dar es Salaam: Tanesco sacks 49 for embezzlement

Written by KILASA MTAMBALIKE.

THE Tanzania Electric Supply Company (Tanesco) last year sacked 49 employees for sabotaging the company through various unorthodox activities, including tampering with meters and making illegal connections.

Acting Tanesco Managing Director, Eng. Felchesmi Mramba, told reporters in Dar es Salaam Thursday that the employees were caught following a special operation, which is ongoing. He also said that this year alone they have managed to arrest, with the help of the police force, 30 independent electricians for indulging in similar activities.

Eng. Mramba stressed that the company is very strict in ensuring that they are supplied with meters that meet international standards, to avoid creating problems to both the company and its customers.

On the shortage of electricity poles and meters, he said that recent shortages will soon end after the company has received fresh supplies that will be distributed throughout the country beginning yesterday. He said that two suppliers have already brought in the country over 20,000 meters while they are waiting for more arrivals.

Furthermore, over 7,000 poles have also been distributed countrywide by supplies and attributed the shortages to delays on the part of the suppliers. “We want to assure the public that by mid June, this year all those who have applied for meters and asked for poles would have been duly served,” he said.

Acting Deputy Managing Director (distribution), Eng. Sophia Mgonja, was also on hand to say that the demand for meters this year is 250,000 and that for poles is 100,000. It was recently reported that the company had shortages of meters and poles and the company had threatened to blacklist its supplies for delays in delivering the same.

Source: http://www.dailynews.co.tz/index.php/local-news/17284-tanesco-sacks-49-for-embezzlement