Police to continue making an effort to remove illegal firearms from society

After the national crime statistics revealed that trio crimes of car hijacking, house and business robberies were on the rise, acting national police commissioner Lieutenant-General Khomotso Phahlane says firearms and ammunition should be taken from the hands of criminals to deal with these crimes.

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SAnews.gov.za reports Phahlane said was speaking following a three-day plenary session with provincial and national police leaders. Further discussions on the issue of the proliferation of illegal firearms would be held in the future.

“Firearms are commonly used in the commission of trio crimes and other serious and violent crimes. We must continue to make a concerted effort, together with stakeholders and communities to remove illegal firearms from society,” said Phahlane, adding it was decided that personnel and resources would be added to police stations to deal with crime.

“It is worth mentioning that there was an encouraging downward trend in the 17 community-reported crimes which are grouped into the categories of contact crime, contact-related crime, property-related crime and other serious crime.

“The serious contact crimes of murder, attempted murder, sexual offences, serious assault, common assault and common robbery all decreased. This leads us to believe that our Back-to-Basics approach to policing is making an impact on the crime picture in our country,” he said, adding that at the increase in robbery with aggravating circumstances

Issues of border crime and protests were also discussed.

While the resolutions made during the meeting would be considered in dealing with crime, they would not be made public to ensure criminals did not access the police’s operational plans.

– Caxton News Service