WATCH: 161 cars rev up Tshwane’s fight against crime

The City of Tshwane is revving up its service delivery and security with the procurement of 161 fleet vehicles. Yesterday, mayor Cilliers Brink launched the new fleet valued at R60 million as part of Tshwane’s fleet strategy to procure its own vehicles and reduce expensive lease costs.

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MMC for corporate and shared services Kingsley Wakelin said 80 of the vehicles will go to the Tshwane Metro Police Department (TMPD) for region operations; 15 vehicles towards the Tshwane Ya Tima programme for revenue collection; 17 are for regional prevention centre.

The energy and electricity department will get 18; water and sanitation 10; five for road and transport for traffic light operations; and 16 for the corporate pool.

Enforcing the law

“The distribution of the 80 vehicles will be used to boost bylaw enforcement operations and we will be launching a by-law enforcement committee team and structure which will add value to by-law enforcement,” he said.

Wakelin said 31 branded vehicles were released immediately, and the remainder will follow suit.

“This is part of the city’s fleet strategy programme we started in 2018, where we focused on buying our own vehicles to reduce our expenses [on] leases.”

He said Brink was the person who started the discussions.

“This is some of the fruits of our labour since 2018 to reduce our expensive leases and enhance our fleet management operations. In 2022, we bought 238 vehicles at the value of R100 million.”

Wakelin said the city has exited most of its vehicle leases. The 161 vehicles consist of double- and single-cab bakkies and sedans and bring the city’s vehicles to 1 513 since 2018 Brink said the vehicles were to serve Tshwane residents.

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“It’s not about the bright and shiny cars, it’s to ensure we can fulfil our mandate as municipality to the people of the city,” he said.

Brink applauded the TMPD commissioner, saying she was slowly but surely changing the culture at the department. He said because mobility was key to fulfilling their mandate, they can now be deployed to key points and keep the roads safe.

“If you can control roads, you can control crime,” he said.

“We’re not at all where we ought to be even after the new cars, but these new additions of vehicles will significantly improve that ratio and improve the capacity of the TMPD.”

MMC for community safety Grandi Theunissen said Tshwane needed the vehicles desperately.

“We have a fleet operation that we can use at the regional level of 80. With the additional 80, we are doubling up. The one complaint I get the most is, we don’t have vehicles, now that problem solved.”