Telkom cables in the Germiston area on the East Rand were cut early on Friday, leading to network congestion, the company said. Three cables were damaged between the Germiston and New Doornfontein.
ADSL users were also encountering a slow network, said Telkom spokesperson Lulu Letlape.
She said that in addition to private users, some of Telkom’s corporate customers, including banks, had also been severely affected.
”The nature of the damage — all three cables were cut — indicates that this is a deliberate effort at wilfully disrupting our services to customers,” said Theo Hess, a Telkom manager.
He said only people with access to and knowledge of Telkom’s network infrastructure would have been in a position to vandalise the cables.
On Tuesday, two cables — one in Ladysmith in KwaZulu-Natal and one in Mthatha in the Eastern Cape — were damaged.
Letlape said that during the week, vandalism to at least 65 street distribution cabinets (SDCs) — which are points of connection usually located on street corners to enable a service to customers — was also detected countrywide. Forty-six of the cases occurred in KwaZulu-Natal.
”We have reported the vandalism to the SDCs as well as today’s incident to the South African Police Service [SAPS].
”At this stage we are uncertain who were behind these acts of vandalism, but a thorough investigation, both through our internal structures as well as through the SAPS, is under way,” said Hess.
He said technicians were working feverishly to restore services to customers. The cables were expected to be reconnected at about midday on Friday. — Sapa