There is some concern especially by AfriForum regarding national police commissioner Riah Phiyega’s take on farm murders.
Phiyega told a South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) hearing on safety and security in farming communities earlier this week that farm murders decreased between 2010 and 2013.
Farm murders declined from 71 and more than 660 incidents in 2010/ 2011 to 58 murders and a little over 400 incidents in the 2013/2014 period.
She added that murders on farms are not the true problem, rather people’s perceptions about it.
“We need to determine what drives people’s feelings (about farm murders). Is it what they read in the newspaper or is it that they really don’t feel safe?,” Phiyega said.
The Institute for Security Studies also indicated that attacks on farms were not racially motivated.
According to AfriForum, Phiyega was not in touch with the realities playing out on South African farms.
Ernst Roets, Deputy CEO of AfriForum expressed his concern about the fact that the police gave comprehensive feedback regarding the content of its rural safety plan, but that they could not indicate to what degree the plan has been implemented.
“Phiyega said farm murders are now fewer than before, and as a result implied that the farm murder situation is not as bad as people think,” Roets said.
Roets described Phiyega’s argument as insignificant.
“The fact that crime has declined from a high extreme to a somewhat lower extreme does not mean that it’s solved. It is our experience at AfriForum that the brutality of farm murders is worsening, but Phiyega didn’t make mention of the brutality.”
What a sick idiot is in charge here. Even one murder is too many! He makes this comment as though people’s lives do not matter.
But woe betide if the victim happens to be a black soccer player, then the whole police force is mobilised. I shout that this is just blatant racism at its worst.