The Democratic Alliance’s municipal election campaign has put a spotlight on Joburg’s drug problem, saying the city was in desperate need of a specialised unit to tackle the scourge and gang bosses linked to the drug business. This as most areas feel the negative effects of nyaope, in particular, on township children.
This was said by the party’s mayoral candidate, Herman Mashaba during an evaluation tour of Kliptown and Eldorado Park police stations. Accompanied by the party’s Shadow Minister of Police Zak Mbhele, and Gauteng shadow MEC for Community Safety Kate Lorimer, Mashaba said police were under-resourced and under-equipped to control drug dealing and drug use resulting in drug-related crimes increasing by 16 percent since 2010. He said the stations visited operated on minimum manpower and vehicles; and were often unable to deploy two vehicles per shift per section.
He attributed the increase in drug abuse to desperation among the youth due to unemployment.
Mashaba further linked the problem to Mayor Parks Tau who, he said, failed to make any progress on service delivery for many years while in power, resulting in over 30 percent unemployed and 66 000 people added to the unemployed ranks in the first quarter. He said drug addiction was people’s desperate attempt to cope with broken the ANC promises.
He compared it to the Western Cape where he said the DA had a proven track record of clean governance and clearing communities of drugs and drug abuse. This, he said, was due to specialist crime prevention units established in Cape Town to focus on specific priority crimes, like drugs, gangs, vice, and tactical response. He explained that specialised Metro police units were able to crack down on drug lords and gang bosses through closer co-operation with the police, with whom they share resources and crime intelligence.
He said a DA-governed city would spend more funds on infrastructure development, support local small businesses, fight corruption and create thousands of jobs to bring hope to the poorest of the poor.
