How they milk a sleeping elephant-TANESCO

TANESCO power consumption met

er No.07026281

The loosely hanging disconected wires 

The power meter can be seen here

The story of electricity theft being so rampant as to bring to its knees the power supply system in India last month has a replica right here. While the local power supply company is snoozing, a few crafty individuals are helping themselves to the juice oozing off its nipples.A case in point is a locality around the pictured transformer in Kilimanjaro region where every evening at between 19:00 EAT and 20:00 EAT there is a power blackout, the people in the neighborhood complained to TANESCO meter readers and maintenance crew but their apparently bothersome noises went unheeded so they decided to do some Sherlock Holmes kind of investigation.
Pictured above is one of eleven houses that are serviced by the transformer in the picture below and have their power supply lines disconnected but are helping themselves to the service every night by removing what they themselves call a 'fuse' at the transformer in the time range mentioned above,when the fuse is removed they inform each other by mobile phones so that they can climb on their rooftops and connect the power lines after which they call back and the fuse is replaced,we know TANESCO does not do patrol work at night so its what you may,with tongue in cheek, call a "win win situation" as the big organisation is busy stealing from huge fake emergency power supply contracts the people are enjoying the fruits of UHURU.Who can you blame?
If the Power company has a working client database they can quickly locate the power meter pictured at the top by its serial number and move into action, if they fail in this then they deserve to be fleeced accordingly.
There is no lack of incentive for people to steal power,the major one being the attitude of the organisation to take its customers for granted(disease of monopoly),see the congestion of bill payers at their Kilimanjaro head office at the bottom of page.

Two views of te transformer that gets its fuse removed and replaced every evening.

Meanwhile at the TANESCO KIlimanjaro regional office the service queue is as you can see,these people are bringing in money,not taking away!!,but they have to wait all the same.