Look out for these pop-up stations in the next few weeks
The Polokwane SAPS, Y-Cop and the Community Policing Forum (CPF) set up stations at various identified crime hotspots in an effort to ensure a safe festive season.
POLOKWANE – These pop-up stations will temporarily be at different places in the city to help the community with various services, as well as to contribute to the overall safety of the residents. This decision followed the warning from the community safety MEC, Mavhungu Lerule-Ramakanya, who said last year’s lowered crime rate was primarily a result of the lockdown regulations and not because of an actual decrease in crime. She recently made more resources available to the police to fight crime during the festive season in the form of vehicles and reflective jackets.
With the launch of the Safer Festive Season campaign, Lerule-Ramakanya confirmed that the most common crime incidents over the festive season are theft. “Criminals made it their business to see the festive season as the best time of the year to target innocent residents. We are going to stop that.”
The Polokwane CPF chairperson, Francois Swart, told Review the pop-up stations are already set up and move from one point to the other, especially in smaller shopping centres. “The first station started this week at Thornhill Shopping Centre and it already moved on to the next location.”
The temporary stations’ goal is for police service to be closer and more readily available to the community and for them to be present in areas where ATM-related crime and bank card fraud are prevalent.
“This way the officials can immediately respond to the residents’ complaints and any incidents that may occur,” Swart explained and added they hope to make more arrests than usual with this initiative. “Just the presence of law officials are usually enough to deter criminals over the festive season.”
He said people who drink in public places will also get arrested more easily if the pop-up stations are set up near public parks. Other services you can expect at these stations are certification of documents, affidavits, incident reports and the opening of police cases.
“The idea is that the stations are set up in one spot for three days before it moves on to the next area,” concluded Swart. The stations will, however, not be available on Sundays.
Dates and places for the pop-up stations:
– The Steakshop in Welgelegen: from November 25.
– The park run field accross from High School Tom Naudé: from November 29.
– Eduan Café: from December 2.
– Elegant Fuel in Marshall Street: from December 6.
