Picture ‘not looking good’ for Gauteng, but ‘very good start’ for amapanyaza

While it may seem Gauteng is losing the battle against crime as it records worrying increases in violent crimes between January and March in 2023, experts say the province has realised its crisis with the launch of the much-needed new crime-busting wardens.

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Presenting the fourth quarter (Q4) crime statistics to the Gauteng legislature’s portfolio committee on community safety yesterday, provincial police commissioner Lieutenant-General Elias Mawela said overall crime in Gauteng increased by 2 129 counts compared with the same time last year.

Gauteng crime

Senior researcher and policing expert at the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), Dr Johan Burger, said the picture does not look good, “but we already knew that when the country’s crime stats were released”.

He noted: “I think Gauteng has realised that it has a problem and that is why Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi announced the establishment of the new crime-busting wardens, in an effort to complement what the national and metro police are doing.

“It’s still very early to say whether they will make an impact but I think it’s a very good start. So, on the one hand there is more that can be done by applying these additional forces to assist the South African Police Service and metro police.”

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He added that it was also important to tackle issues such as the policing and enforcement within the country in terms of implementing it more rigorously.

“And have a strategy in place to deal with the socioeconomic conditions in addition to the enforcement and crime,” he said.

Mawela said although the overall percentage had not gone down, they had made significant progress, because over the fiveyear period, Gauteng’s contribution to national crime stats was reducing slightly.

“In 2019 our contribution was 28.2%, which reflects a decrease by 1%.”

Vigilantism

He said vigilantism, mob justice, arguments, misunderstanding, road rage, provocation and robbery were the top causative factors contributing to murders.

“It is worrying to see that some people have resorted to taking the law into their own hands, resulting in what we describe as vigilantism [mob justice, or] community retaliation.

“This continues to have a negative affect on the murder rate in the province,” said Mawela.

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Gauteng recorded 1 556 murders in the three months, 82 sexual offences were reported in the same period – 18 more than this time last year – while kidnappings increased by 17.1% in Q4.

“The reduction in sexual offences may be attributed to Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences and Social Crime Prevention [units] supported by corporate communication and liaison conducting focused crime awareness campaigns,” he said.

Mawela said more than 60 children were murdered in Gauteng from January to March this year. However, contact crimes remained a major contributor to the province’s crime stats. The province also recorded 27 cash-in-transit robberies in just three months, five more than in the same period last year.

Crime intelligence

However, during a debate in parliament, Police Minister Bheki Cele said crime intelligence in the country has been weak.

“But we are strengthening that element. We believe that as we are putting every duck in a row, life will be difficult for criminals,” he said.

“If you check for the last two months, there have been serious operations where the criminals were found at their base before going out to run their operations.

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“And that shows us that crime intelligence [across the country] is starting to work and police are starting to be sharper as well.”

– reitumetsem@citizen.co.za