Vodafone Ghana customers in the Madina area have been left without voice and internet services after one of the largest copper cable theft incidents in the country.

According to Modern Ghana, 1 km of cable that lies between the country’s Adenta trotro station and SSNIT flats junction has been stolen. And it could take up to three weeks to repair the network outage.

Costs to repair the cable are also expected to be more than $100,000. Madina has a population of over 100,000 people

Vodafone Ghana says that 25% of fixed broadband faults reported are a result of cable theft.

According to Modern Ghana, last year Vodafone Ghana lost $2.6 million replacing stolen cables in order to restore services to the customers affected.

It has also been reported that the mobile operator experienced the highest number of cable thefts in a single month in December 2012, when it reported 47 cable thefts in some areas of the country.

Nana Yaa Ofori Atta, head of external affairs at Vodafone Ghana said, “We have intensified our campaign to catch those responsible for cable theft, which causes disruption not just to our customers, but to the local community.”

“The most important people in this battle are members of the community. A lot of these incidents occur in broad daylight or at very odd hours in the night and we need anyone who sees anything they feel is suspicious to call the police,” Atta added.

Modern Ghana says that since August 2012 over 15,500 fixed broadband customers have been left without internet service as a result of 186 cable theft incidents all over the country.