Rehana Rossouw
THE massive manhunt and successful capture this week of Dawid “Doggy Dog” Ruiters, suspected of killing five people in Nieuwoudtville, has focused national attention on crime in the Cape’s rural communities.
Ruiters’s capture followed the murder of two women and a four-year-old child in Niewoudtville in the Northern Cape last month.
For months, community leaders in towns and hamlets in the Cape have been warning of an influx of gangs seeking new markets for their drugs and safe houses for their members.
Last Saturday, 500 residents in Clanwilliam, in the Western Cape, who claim their warnings had been ignored, marched on a house they suspected was being used by gangsters. They clashed with police, leaving 28 protestors and seven police officers injured.
On the same day, representatives from eight towns met in Saldanha Bay to discuss with the Western Cape Anti-Crime Forum how they could counter criminal activity in their areas. Many discovered that their problems were not unique.
Clanwilliam prosecutor Jonas White said that four months ago residents in the town began suspecting a gang, The Firm, had bought a house in the area. They complained to the police, but nothing was done.
“Clanwilliam is a small town, people notice strangers immediately. What they noticed at this house was that expensive cars kept pulling up day and night, but the occupants did not seem to be employed,” White said.
“Some of our youth were lured into the house. One of them disappeared for five months and when he returned, he told us he was now a member of the Terrible Josters and had been taken to another town to learn about gangs and how to use weapons.”
Crime began increasing. So far this year, police have investigated 21 cases of dagga possession, 13 cases of dealing in dagga and one case of dealing in mandrax – almost double the number of drug cases investigated last year.
The potential for violence increased as the community began mobilising against crime. An 11-year-old boy confessed he had been instructed to kill the daughter of a community leader, Johannes Beukes. The boy was taken to the police station where he signed a confession and a charge of murder was laid. He has not yet been arrested.
“The police admitted to us they do not know how to deal with the situation. They are ignorant about gangs and drugs because they have not had to face such issues before,” White said.
This is why the community welcomed an initiative last month which saw members of the Internal Stability Unit moved into Clanwilliam to boost the local police. But ironically, it was these policemen who opened fire on protestors last Saturday.
A representative of the police/ community forum in Stellenbosch, Frankie Adams, told the anti-crime meeting that policing in rural towns was not effective because it was still racist.
“There is not one black officer in Stellenbosch, white policemen still serve mostly white areas and there is a distinct difference in the quality of service provided to white and black areas,” he said.
In Morreesburg, residents are to meet the Human Rights Commission to ask it to investigate police and justice officials in their town.
Paralegal Adriaan Markus has collected affidavits from residents which claim police collude with criminals and farmers to the detriment of black residents. He claimed that human rights are frequently abused in the town’s prison cells.