Kenya: 3 Suspects Arrested With Vandalized Kenya Power Equipment in Juja

Nairobi — Three suspects have been arrested by the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) after they were discovered with vandalized Kenya Power equipment worth millions of shillings in Juja.

According to the investigative agency, the arrest comes two months after President Uhuru Kenyatta, announced a moratorium in scrap metal trade due to runaway vandalism, targeting critical national infrastructure.

“In an intelligence-driven operation, DCI sleuths from Headquarters Operations Branch, raided a scrap metal yard in Juja’s Matangi area, where Several vandalized KPLC transformers, rolls of aluminum conductors and assorted materials belonging to the Kenya Power company were recovered,” the DCI stated.

“A further search in nearby homesteads led to the recovery of more vandalized apparatus, where a container full of steel bracings obtained from critical electricity transmission towers were recovered,” DCI added.

The President said unscrupulous traders are threatening the country’s economy by vandalizing critical installations has hit alarming rates.

The DCI recounted the January incident when Kenyan homes and businesses were plunged into darkness after a high voltage transmission line connecting the capital collapsed, in what was suspected to be high-level vandalism.

In November 2021, operations along the busy Mombasa-Nairobi Standard gauge railway (SGR) had to be stopped for two hours, after gauge blocks were vandalized from the line.