BRYAN PEARSON, Cape Town | Thursday 5.10pm.
OPERATION Good Hope, a police operation to crack down on urban terrorism in Cape Town, moved into full swing on Thursday as six members of vigilante group People Against Gangsterism and Drugs were charged in court, another five were arrested and a number of houses raided.
Heavily armed police squeezed into a packed Cape Town Magistrate’s Court on Thursday morning as the six Pagad members arrested on Monday night trouped into the dock. The men, allegedly arrested in possession of five hand guns, a pump-action shot gun and 200 rounds of ammunition, have all admitted to being members of Pagad’s armed wing G-Force.
Defence lawyer Paul Eia argued that the six men were innocent and that all but one of the weapons found by police were licensed; the sixth, he said, was “planted” by police.
They were not asked to plead and the case was postponed until February 11 to allow police more time to investigate the case.
Police have described Monday’s arrest as a “major breakthrough” in the fight against urban terrorism in Cape Town, which has seen 80 bombings and about 600 attacks in the form of assassinations, drive-by shootings and petrol-bombings in the last year.
The court appearance followed an announcement by police earlier on Thursday that five other Pagad members were arrested near Prince Albert, about 300km from Cape Town. Police spokesperson Captain Anine de Beer said police found several unlicensed firearms in their car.
She added that police raided three homes of Pagad members in the Cape Flats during the night. However, the raids produced nothing.
Meanwhile, Pagad national secretary Abeeda Roberts said police are arresting “the wrong people”.
“All they want is information to frame our leaders and arrest them. All they are doing is interrogating the suspects and forcing them to give the police information which they want to link our national co-ordinator, Abdusalaam Ebrahim, to the acts of terror,” Roberts said. — AFP