The Elsies River Community Policing Forum are objecting to Shoprite Checkers Liquor request to extend their trading hours at the Avonwood Square Mall in Elsies River until 8pm. Chairperson Hamish Arries says that alcohol is one of the main contributing factors to crime in the area.
If the people in the area have access to alcohol until such an hour, they anticipate an increase in liquor related crime such as public violence, domestic violence, assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm. Arries says that later trading hours will increase pedestrian traffic at night, especially pedestrians under the influence of alcohol, who contribute enormously to the high death toll on our roads.
Motorists having access to alcohol later in the evening will also exacerbate our high number of alcohol related road accidents involving motor vehicles. We spoke to Pastor Dino Stewart who owns Dino’s Towing and he says that he deals daily with accident scenes that are caused by drunk drivers.
Stewart says that he does not like the idea of extended hours for alcohol. He experiences the effects of drivers being under the influence of alcohol. It is disgusting to allow something like that. The community does not need that. I get to scenes where the wife is laying dead on the road, and the kids are crying out, while the husband and father just stands there intoxicated. He does not even know what is going on around him. It is the same thing with the taxi drivers, it is heartsore to see these things happen within our community.
The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) are saying that they are helping the over 100 homeless people that were squatting at the taxi rank, train station and mosque in Wynberg. They need to provide passenger train services that makes citizens feel safe and secure for.
Prasa spokesperson Andiswa Makanda says that on Friday the 23 February a violent incident occurred at The Hill, prompting the deployment of Prasa Protection Services personnel to intervene and restore order to the area.
She says that due to concerns for their safety, the remaining dwellers requested to be relocated from the area and they were promptly moved to safe shelters according to the Daily Voice.
Following the murder of popular rapper Kiernan Forbes - AKA and his DJ/Entrepreneur Tebello Motsoane known as Tibz, five suspects have been arrested. The incident occurred in Durban and the police have been on the trail of the gun for hire. They have made their appearance in the Durban Magistrates Court earlier today. INN’s Noel Ruiters reports that the two victims were followed throughout the evening in Durban. The incident occurred a year ago and is still an emotional tiem for both families, as well as the fans. The South African police confirmed that AKA was the main target. The suspects were arrested on Tuesday the 28 February and have crime related cases linked to their names.
Kleinvlei criminals were filmed with pistols and rifles while attending a funeral in Joe Slovo over the weekend. They are shown in a video smiling and dancing in the streets. They were firing shots without being concerned where the bullets landed. The Horribles gang from Melton Rose showed no regards for anyone.
According to a representative of the Kleinvlei Community Policing Forum (CPF) the community are fed up with gangsters who are holding Kleinvlei residents hostage. The Daily Voice reports that law abiding citizens are not safe, some of our mothers and fathers know who the perpetrators are, but they are afraid to speak up because intimidation is the order of the day.
Their area was quiet for a while, now shootings, extortions, drug and liquor, turf fights and innocent people and children die at the hands of these thugs. Police spokesperson Captain FC van Wyk is aware of the videos and says that according to reports no cases, injuries or damages were reported. Two persons of interest were identified, the matter is receiving attention.
Western Cape Minister of Police Oversight and Community Safety, Reagen Allen says that the Law Enforcement Advancement Plan (LEAP) officers continue to work creating safer communities. They conduct various operations and patrols in the hotspot areas where they are deployed. For the month of January officers confiscated 17 firearms and arrested 1 103 individuals for various crimes.
The places that they confiscated the weapons are Atlantis, Bishop Lavis, Delft, Gugulethu, Harare, Khayeltisha, Manenberg, Mfuleni, Mitchells Plain, Nyanga, Samora Machel. Allen says that an independent report, by the Institute of Security Studies, already indicates that between the four provinces of Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Eastern and Western Cape, - the Western Cape is the only province that has shown a decrease in the murder rate the last five years.
Thanks to the dedicated work of our LEAP officers, I know that this trend will continue with the overall murder rate continuing to decrease in the next five years.
The Basic Education Laws Amendment known as the BELA Bill is getting a lot of attention as sessions and public participation is expected to happen over the matter. BELA seeks to amend key education laws in South Africa reports IOL.
The following are the changes that will be implemented if the BELA Bill goes through:
- Making Grade R Compulsory
- Criminalising parental negligence in school attendance
- Home education regulation
- Language policy in schools
- Accommodating religion in school codes of conduct
- Ban on corporal punishment
For those opposing the new rules, there will be a handover of a memorandum against the Bill on the 1st of March at 10 am in Hanover Street in District Six. They are going to march to the Provincial Legislature, to the offices of the premier and the president. The people involved are saying that they want full authority over when their children start formal education, where they attend school and what they are taught in school.
