MONDAY, 8.30AM
SOME 600 associations around the country, including residents’ associations and farmers’ groups, will protest against crime on Tuesday by blockading city roads between dawn and 9.00AM as a result of a call by the SA Guild of Motoring Journalists. Even pilots may join the protests by refusing to fly.
A major transport company has offered to use its large trucks to barricade national highways, with protest signs painted on the truck sides. Four portable toilet hire companies have offered to place toilets at intervals along highways in Gauteng.
Police have reacted by warning that they they will have extra men on duty tomorrow to remove the blockades, and will arrest anyone who refuses to co-operate. A police spokesman said: “Our hearts go out to them … The police know that the protesters are on the side of the police … but the way in which they want to protest is wrong.”
MONDAY, 5.30PM
SAFETY and Security Minister Sydney Mufamadi on Monday described as untrue the perception that the government is not responding to crime while dealing swiftly with anti-crime protests.
Speaking about the government’s response to crime in general, Mufamadi said his ministry and the SA Police Services are successfully reducing the 20 most serious crime categories, as reflected in the latest quarterly release of audited crime statistics. He said the impression that police are not responding to high levels of crime is untrue and is used with political expediency by opposition parties, worsening the situation.
“They are using it to discredit the government and exploit a popular sentiment. They wittingly, or unwittingly, celebrate crime when it occurs and downplay our success in responding to it,” he said. He added these opposition parties (which he did not identify) are not empowering the public to gain an objective understanding of the problem.
Mufamadi said the government is responding to crime through various operations, including high-density operations in all nine provinces, which is shown in declining crime figures. “You can’t achieve that if you are doing nothing,” he said. Other action includes finalising the opening of a detective training academy and the recruitment of internationl experts to instruct detectives and trainers.
Mufamadi added that the government has succeeded in efforts to have the “dark figure” of unreported crime eradicated. The public is now reporting most incidents of crime, especially social fabric crimes such as rape, family violence and child abuse. This is an achievement in itself, he said.