Crime is stabilising

2003-06-10 21:00

Cape Town - Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula on Tuesday rededicated his department to fighting crime, and said the number of murders continued to drop while certain priority crimes were stabilising.

Introducing debate on his budget vote in the National Assembly, he said that for the first time since 1994, rape figures were declining, and aggravated robberies were dropping significantly.

However, street robberies, common burglaries and theft remained a concern.

Although crime statistics would only be tabled in parliament as part of the South African Police Service's annual report - as was the international norm - statistics were used internally on a day-to-day basis to determine crime patterns, hot spots and operational planning.

"We use this information for operational planning and to deploy our members in concentrated operations," he said.

Regarding the report of the committee of inquiry into farm attacks, Nqakula said he received a progress report from committee chair Charl du Plessis on Monday, which also gave an indication of some of the main findings so far.

These included that "by far the largest impetus behind farm attacks in the narrow sense of the word is of a purely criminal nature, namely the desire to rob".

The committee could find no evidence that farm attacks per se were part of an orchestrated campaign to drive white farmers off the land.

However, the committee believed suitable steps should be taken to deal with illegal land occupations to prevent it becoming a crime risk.

Nqakula said he would discuss these issues as a matter of urgency with the minister of agriculture and land affairs, and with the commissioners of the Land Claims Commission.

The committee's full and final report was expected within a month.

Commando system

Turning to the scheduled replacement of the commando system by a revised SAPS reservist system, he said reservists were in the process of being recruited from existing structures.

These included the defence force commandos and the more than 75 000 volunteers who participated in the recent Letsema campaign.

To phase out the commando system and implement the new reservist system, defence force exit and police entry plans had now been completed, and would be introduced over six years, Nqakula said.

He also repeated his warning that political violence would not be tolerated.

"Any person who engages in this will be arrested and criminally prosecuted... we remain alert for any other eventualities from those bent on political violence."

Vigilantism would also not be tolerated.

"No-one has the right to take the law into their own hands. The police are there and are making every effort to deal with incidents of crime."

Vigilantism helped people with other agendas, particularly those involved in organised crime who "must knock off" their competitors, Nqakula said.

- SAPA