Criminals should have a healthy fear of cops

There is a video of a group of young males terrorising drivers as they drive on a road that goes through what looks like an informal settlement.

The video, taken from a drone that the criminals are totally unaware of, shows how they target vehicles as they slow down to stop at an intersection.

They smash the car windows and grab whatever they want in the car, before lazily jogging back to the safety of the informal settlement.

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The attackers are so brazen and fearless, walking back into the settlement totally unaware of the drone overhead.

This is but a small window into SA’s crime situation.

As new Minister of Police Senzo Mchunu settles into his role and starts defining his era, the whole country hopes he is aware of the criminality captured in that drone video, or thousands of others captured on CCTV in broad daylight across the country.

The smash-and-grab phenomenon captured in the video is nothing new but in the past, the perpetrators never took refuge in their own communities.

There was an element of shame but also a genuine fear that the community would turn on them.

The last thing they fear in the captured video is law enforcement. And that is Mchunu’s biggest problem. Criminals need to fear law enforcement and its efficiency, even when the police are not visible.

The minister is right to stress the importance of intelligence and technology in the fight against crime.

If things are done right, the police should be spending part of their tight budget not only on pursuing the use of technology such as drones to reduce crime, but forging relationships with private companies and individuals for the use of their already existing technology without breaking the bank.

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South Africa is full of communities who, like the one in the drone, know who the criminals are in their midst, but are paralysed by fear of being targeted by the criminals for speaking out.

When Mchunu says a bullet fired at the police is a declaration of war, it goes some way towards letting the criminals know that their decision to participate in violent crime will be responded to with the same violence that they terrorise the communities and the cops with.

There are a lot of murmurs about human rights violations following what the police in KwaZulu-Natal have been doing in fighting back at suspected criminals with what is considered a high number of casualties.

The Independent Police Investigative Directorate must be given room to investigate possible abuse by the police, without becoming a hindrance to the cops.

For far too long, the country has stood by and watched while political leadership shouted “shoot to kill”, without providing the necessary support and intelligence to locate criminals planning violent armed robberies such as cashin-transit heists and kidnappings.

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It is up to Mchunu to provide the mental muscle that will ensure that, whenever the police aim and shoot at criminals or suspects, it is for the right reasons.

This country’s economic progress is being held captive by rampant crime but, of more concern to citizens, is that their personal safety is left to chance.

Citizens go about their daily lives with a constant fear of being attacked in their homes, on the roads and at their places of work.

If Mchunu gets it right, it will not be the ordinary citizen who will live in fear, but it will be criminals who will fear police intelligence and actions so much that they do not do crime.