Eastern Cape Premier Lubabalo ‘Oscar’ Mabuyane, on 16 July 2019, led a high delegation of government leaders which included the Executive Mayor of Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality Cllr. Mongameli Bobani; the South African Police Services (SAPS) Provincial Commissioner Liziwe Ntshinga, Safety and Security Portfolio Chairperson in the Eastern Cape Province Babalwa Lobishe and members of the northern areas community policing forum during a visit to this area that has in the recent past seen a rise in gang related killings that affected innocent community members including toddlers.
As part of the government’s responsibility amongst its key priorities, safety and security of all citizens becomes an important aspect of the agenda of government. Premier Mabuyane made rounds in the streets of the northern areas such as Bethelsdorp, where he visited two local schools Arcadia Secondary School and Strelitzia Primary School. Preceding these two visits was a door-step tour at the well-equipped 10111 SAPS centre in Schauderville where he wanted to have a first-hand experience of how criminal activities that are reported are processed from the time they are reported to the instance of their resolution.
Speaking at Arcadia Secondary School, Mabuyane did not mince his words in indicating that government was determined to uproot criminal activities in the area and would not allow any lawlessness. “Schools are government property and thus students become government property when in schools. It is the responsibility of the government to ensure that learners are safe when at school and that it never happens again that they get injured and even die on school premises because of gangsters. Gangsters have no place in society, we can’t cohabitate with them,” said Mabuyane.
The Premier further promised, as part of his intervention to the gang related activities in the area to ensure that the prefabricated building structure of Arcadia Secondary School would be a discussion he has with the MEC for Education and come up with a speedy solution whilst he indicated that Strelitzia Primary School would be getting new safe fencing for the school that would contribute towards increased safety for the learners.
13 new police branded vehicles were handed over which included 10 double-cab bakkies for the Anti Gang Unit, 2 fast speed VW Golf VIIs for the Tactical Response Team for Mount Road and Motherwell Clusters and 1 for the Flying Squad.
Provincial Commissioner Ntshinga indicated that this was the beginning of a journey to resource the dedicated SAPS teams that are capable of dealing with the gangs and fighting corruption in the area. She further alluded to the fact that community members have a key and pivotal role to play in the fight against crime. SAPS has formed an Anti- Gang Unit, which consist of different clusters with about 154 deployed members. “We are hard at work; we do not have time to waste time. We will be going door to door, street to street and corner to corner facing and fighting crime monitoring and protecting our children,” said Ntshinga.
South Africa Today – South Africa News
