The Safe City: The Metro Cops will always be at the centre of our safety policy

Note to editors: The following is an extract from a speech delivered by Patricia de Lille at 13h00 in Macassar today.

This City has done much to tackle crime over the past five years. Under the DA, Cape Town has become safer for all of its citizens. We have focused on a community approach to tackling crime but we in the DA have always believed that a properly trained and resourced metro police must be one of the centerpieces of safety policy.

Our vision for Cape Town's safety includes:

• The Metro Police
• The Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading (VPUU) programme
• Fundamentals of political leadership and management
• Community partnerships
• Partnerships with other domestic stakeholders, domestically and internationally

The full details are available in the document available to download here.

Today, Cape Town's metro police are under threat from the national ANC government who want to take our successful police service away from us and combine it into one single police service.

We will not let our safety be compromised or have the national government interfere with a policy that is working. I have already told the Minister of Police, Nathi Mthethwa, that he should look at the successes of Cape Town's metro cops before he makes a decision on the a single police service.

The idea of a single police service is one that has been around for some time. In its 1992 document, ‘Ready to govern,' the ANC recommended it. In 2007, at their Polokwane conference, the ANC yet again recommended it with a resolution. And when the Zuma administration was sworn in, the new ministry of police undertook to investigate the feasibility of its implementation.

Crime affects all South Africans and it has been our challenge as a democratic society to look for new and innovative ways to confront this problem which affects us all.

The DA government in Cape Town has taken the approach that fighting crime requires a collaborative effort amongst all members of the community, from local, provincial and national government, through to the metro and provincial police with the South African Police Service (SAPS) to the very people of the communities themselves.

Only by working together can we fight crime. The DA's community approach to crime has focused on given people the resources to take ownership of their communities. But it has also provided resources and training to those law enforcers and safety officers that fall under a metro's jurisdiction: the metro police.

We have demonstrated in Cape Town that a metro police service, when properly trained and led by the right people and given the tools to do its job, can act as a powerful tool in the fight against crime. That is why a strong metro police force has been and will remain a focal point of our community-based approach to crime fighting. Not only do the metro police assist the community directly through their function, but they also assist the community by providing support in community-based approaches to crime fighting.

Statement issued by Patricia de Lille, DA Mayoral Candidate for Cape Town, April 17 2011

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