A Meadowridge lawn bowls club has been left with thousands of rand worth of damage and minus two water pumps and cabling following a burglary during load shedding.
Bill McCarthy, the Meadowridge Bowling Club’s greenkeeper, believes the break-in early on Sunday January 22 was planned.
“They knew exactly what they were going to do. They cut the fence, they stole a pump, then they went to the toilet flush pump. There was a cage around, but they cut it with cutters and it all happened during a power outage. This we are sure of. It was Sunday morning between the hours of 2 to 4 am.”
The club of 110 members has two 35m-wide greens that are irrigated with pumped borehole water.
Cub chairman David King said it would cost the club R20 000 to replace the pumps and fix the damage caused by their removal.
In the meantime, the club is using a mobile pump to water the greens.
“We are going to secure our new pumps behind a wall. There are metal cages, but they can cut those things. So we are going to build a sort of pump room, and we are going to brick it in properly.”
Diep River police spokesman Sergeant Zak Marais said they were investigating, but no arrests had been made.
“Access was gained to the property by cutting the fence,” he said.
The club’s activities and competitions would go ahead as normal, said Mr King.
“It is basically a massive nuisance and an expense, but we obviously ‘maak ’n plan’. We’ve got our very big Engen Meadowridge Midweek competition that starts in late march. It runs for five weeks. Then we have a Rawson Relay on March 21. Then we have what we call our Engen Meadowridge Ladies Day, that is on May 12. And there are a lot of internal competitions as well.”
