Deputy Police Minister Maggie Sotyu says police will deploy over 100 men and women in blue in the Nyanga township in the Western Cape – an area which is notorious for its high murder rate.
The Deputy Minister said this when briefing journalists on the side-lines of her visit to the area to meet with members of the community and the police.
Deputy Minister Sotyu was in the area for a meeting with members of the community to give a report back on immediate plans that will be rolled-out in the area to respond to crime.
“The reason I am here today is that the last time I had an imbizo in this area, we promised the community of the Nyanga cluster that the first thing that we are going to do when we go back to Parliament will be giving resources to this area.
“Today I am coming to give a report to the members of the community and the police about the commitment that we made – myself and the Minister – that we will give them more police officers.
“As a result of that, we embarked on the re-enlistment of police officers who had left the service and felt that they needed to come back.
“Of the number of officers that were accepted back into the service, we decided that 100 of those will be given to this area,” she said.
When the Deputy Minister, along with Police Minister Nathi Nhleko, released crime statistics in Parliament recently, Nyanga Police Station was listed as a hotspot – along with eight other police stations in the Western Cape – where the most murders were reported.
The Deputy Minister said more police will be deployed in the area soon.
“… We have students from the colleges and of those students that will be graduating, we will also give this province a very big number in trying to fight crime in this area.”
She also said while the SA Police Service has approved the proposal for more police stations to be built in the area, it would not be possible to wait until construction is completed as the fight against crime was urgent.
She said satellite police stations would be erected in various spots that they have identified.
“… We had a meeting last week where we asked every provincial commissioner to identify a hotspot … (where) there are no police stations. We decided that starting from next month, we will focus on those areas.
“We will be bringing a mobile police station to areas like Siphumelele, where we know that every day a person gets killed, within two weeks from now…
“Building a police station does not take a day or two… Therefore we can’t wait for (long)… We need a short term solution.”
Deputy Minister to visit a shooting victim
The Deputy Minister said she would visit a boy who got injured during a shoot-out in Nyanga at the weekend, where nine members of the police were ambushed and three were fatally wounded.
He is receiving treatment at the Red Cross Hospital.
The Deputy Minister said police investigations have revealed that two of the three members of the police that were shot belonged to a gang in the area.
“There is a nine-year-old boy who was also shot, but I think that he was not part of what was happening there, he was just one of the people who were passing when the shooting was taking place.
“He is in Red Cross Hospital and after my meeting here, I will go visit this young boy.” – SAnews.gov.za
