Abstract

While the level of accessibility of electricity is low in developing countries and the energy sector receiving less foreign investments, there is another aspect that is contributing negatively to the effort of increasing access and improving reliability of electricity. This is the practice of vandalizing electrical installations. Of relevance to this study is vandalism targeted at one of the most crucial equipment in provision of electricity, the distribution transformer. This study was conducted to identify and critically analyse the root cause(s) of distribution transformer vandalism. This is crucial realizing that if vandalism goes unchecked, the developing countries’ goals, including Malawi, of increasing accessibility to electricity will be difficult to achieve. This research took an interpretivism philosophy with a phenomenological stance but was mainly constructionivism with an inductive approach. The sample was drawn from Southern Electricity Supply on non probability, purposive sampling principles. Four instruments were developed targeting members of the local community, key informants, vandalism participants and another instrument for recording physical attributes of a vandalized transformer site. Data was analysed using SPSS and Microsoft excel computer packages. The majority of the respondents from the community are of the view that former ESCOM employees are behind the vandalism seconded by thieves while businessmen and ESCOM employees are third and fourth respectively. Most respondents think distribution transformers are vandalized by people involved from far and that they do this due to poverty in search of oil. Most transformers were targeted because they were either isolated and concealed from public scrutiny or there was no security at the time of the act. oil, which has got many uses and is easily converted into cash on the black market. This is done by people who have fair technical knowledge of how transformers work. These people mostly do not live within the surrounding of the victimized transformers and have got organized groups. The findings have further shown that most of the transformers that are vandalized are located in activity nodes. These activity nodes are residential areas, commercial areas and trading areas. These locations have high presence of people capable and motivated to carry out vandalism during day time. However, it is established that most acts of vandalism are carried out at night. The study recommends that vandalism can be significantly reduced if there is more sensitization particularly to some key department in the Malawi Police Service and the judiciary. Furthermore, there is need to review the penalties given to convicted offenders and apply strategies that will not allow vandalized materials enter the market.

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School	: School of Law, Economics and Government
Issued Date	: 2008

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