LAGOS MOVES TO CRIMINALISE POWER THEFT VANDALISATION.{PHOTOS}.

                           The Lagos State Government todaay tuesday said it has concluded plans to enact a law to specifically crminalise and punish severely persons who engage in power theft and vandalisation,expressing optimism that it would go a long way to tackle the menace headlong.Commissioner for Energy and Mineral Resources,Mr Olawale Oluwo,who said this at the ongoing Ministerial press briefing to commemorate the second year in office of Goverment was worried that its efforts to ensure streets of Lagos are well lit was being threatened by vandals.He said the Government had noticed a trend where some electricity infrastructures are damaged by hit and run motorists,saying that such was detrimental to the quest of the State to ensure that every nook and cranny of the State is lit.But he said the State Government was coming up with a law under its Embedded Power Initiative to protect public lighting infrastructures from such destruction and vandalisation.''We have noticed this vandalisation in three ways.The first one is that by weekends,between Friday and Sunday,we see a lot of vehicles knock down our electricity poles and we suffer the consequences.So,we make sure that each time we apprehend them we make them to pay fines because we cannot prosecute them under a law that is not existing,so the Embedded Power Programme would come with its own Power Theft Law and we would try to embed this street lighting protection under it,so until the law,we cannot prosecute them,we can only continue to fine them to pay for the street light poles they knock down,'' Oluwo said.More photos below.