Following an announcement by Police Minister Bheki Cele last week that he is deploying the army to curb gang violence on the Cape Flats, residents have been waiting
anxiously for troops to arrive.
On Thursday night, Cele, during a debate on the SAPS budget in the National Assembly, announced the SANDF would join a large police contingent to be deployed to several policing precincts.
“We’ll do that at Khayelitsha, Philippi East, Harare, Gugulethu, Mfuleni, Kraaifontein, Mitchells Plain, Bishop Lavis, Delft, Elsies River, Nyanga...where people have been dying,” Cele told MPs.
“We’ll go door to door, we’ll collect every illegal firearm, we’ll collect all criminals that we want, we’ll collect all outstanding criminals that have been on bail and that is happening from two o’clock this [Friday] morning.”
Top cop Bheki Cele said he’d send in the army, but mense are still waiting. File image
However, by Sunday night, not a single soldaat had set foot in gang hotspots.
The Daily Voice can reveal that the troops landed at Air Force Base Ysterplaat on Friday and were undergoing orientation to “get them ready” for operations.
General Solly Shoke said the SANDF has been tasked to assist the police with “Operation Prosper” between July and October 2019.
But SANDF spokesperson, Brigadier-General Mafi Mgobozi, said the soldiers were “briefed” about the “conditions on the ground” in the areas where they would be deployed.
Brigadier-General Mafi Mgobozi, said the soldiers were “briefed” about the “conditions on the ground”. File image
He would not confirm how long the process would take or how many soldiers would be deployed for “security reasons”.
“We just don’t go in; the soldiers have to be briefed first to get them ready,” Mgobozi said.
The military’s arrival coincides with a two-day crime summit in Paarl over the weekend to come up with solutions for crime and gang violence.
The summit, with the theme “Building a United Front in the Fight Against Crime”, saw more than 500 delegates in attendance, including community policing forums and Cele, as well as Social Development Minister Lindiwe Zulu, reports the Weekend Argus.
Western Cape Premier Alan Winde has welcomed Cele’s announcement, but said this only emphasised that police cannot control the gangs.
“This a clear admission that the police have lost control of the war on crime,” said Winde.
“Last weekend alone (5-7 July), 55 deaths by gunshot or stabbing by a sharp object were recorded in the province, with 33 of these in the Metro West region.”
According to seasoned cop, Colonel Edward Clark, who testified in the murder case of Strandfontein dad Grant Fredericks, murders between April 2016 and March 2017 stood at 3311, but that rose to 3418 over the same period a year later.
Clark has 27 years service and is now part of the Anti-Gang Unit.