The DA will put 250 000 police on the streets
6 April 2014
Note to Editors: This is an extract of a speech delivered by DA Leader Helen Zille during today's anti-crime march in Mitchell's Plain, Cape Town.
Tomorrow evening Shrien Dewani will be escorted by South African marshals from Britain to appear in the Cape Town High Court on Tuesday morning. He will be charged with hiring two hit men to murder his wife in Cape Town in 2010.
As the Premier of this province, I am frustrated that this story will lead news bulletins this week. Because I know that most people in the Western Cape and South Africa are good citizens who play by the rules. This is a great country of good people. And, of course, I hate seeing South Africa's reputation tarnished in the eyes of the world. I want people to know the truth about the Western Cape: the province with the lowest unemployment, the best living conditions, and rising education and health standards.
But I equally know that there is still far too much crime in our communities. There are too many loved ones being lost to violence or drugs, or as is usually the case, a toxic combination of both.
This morning we are standing shoulder to shoulder with the community of Mitchells Plain. We are standing together in the fight against gangs and drugs. We are standing together for a safer community.
The gangsters think they are above the law - that the law doesn't apply to them. Members of rival gangs use our streets to settle their scores, with no regard for who gets hurt.
They think they're "cool", but they are destroying people's lives. They don't represent our young people.
We must fight back against gangs, drug barons and the thugs who have made your lives a misery for years.
I believe that we have the determination to confront this and turn it around. The DA is tough on crime. We propose tough, no-nonsense policing. What really matters in the fight against crime is the amount of time that the police spend on the streets.
The police have seemed powerless to stop the mayhem, suffocated by bureaucracy, and intimidated by gang leaders. No preventative strategy appears to be in place.
It's no good if the police spend all their time sitting in offices, or going to meetings. We need police on the streets, fighting crime, catching gangsters, and throwing the dealers into prison.
The DA would immediately make communities safer by putting 250 000 trained police officers on the streets. We want to see a strong police presence in every street and in every community, deterring criminals, and cracking down on violence.
We will make sure that these officers are properly trained, and they are measured by how many criminals they arrest, not by how many meetings they attend.
South Africans have had enough of gangsters and drugs wrecking lives, families and communities. The DA will bring back the specialised narcotics bureau into the South African Police.
Why did the national government scrap the drug unit and the gang unit? These units were having real success, and then they were shut down. They won't tell us why. That leaves only one conclusion: they were shut down by the then commissioner, Jackie Selebi, because he became friends with some "big fish" who did not want their activities effectively investigated.
But where the DA governs, we have started our own specialised units. We have started our own dedicated law enforcement agencies, even though sometimes it is not in our mandate to do so. We know that it's the right thing to do, we know that this is what our communities need to fight crime.
We've established a dedicated Gang Unit in the Cape Town Metro Police. These elite metro police officers were handpicked to solely focus on combating drug dealing and gangsterism on the Cape Flats.
They identify gangs and drug hot spots, gather intelligence on the gangs and drug dealers, and increase the number of road-blocks aimed at crippling gangs and drug networks.
We are also piloting the School Resource Officer programme. Ten officers were appointed to seven schools identified as pilot sites in 2012. This programme was expanded last September with the addition of 60 more officers in response to gang violence at more schools.
This is what the DA is already doing in government. But we cannot fight crime alone. We're honest about that. Government cannot be on every street or patrolling every alley - nor should it. We can only defeat crime if we tackle family breakdown, and if we tackle drug addiction. Together, we can change our communities for the better. Together, we can fight crime and make our communities safer.
Stand Together with the DA on 7 May. Together for Change, Together for Jobs.
Issued by the DA, April 6 2014
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