KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi has said that the eThekwini Municipality is the biggest contributor to crime statistics in the province and is closely followed by the uMgungundlovu District Municipality.
Mkhwanazi, speaking at an anti-crime summit, said 40% of the crime in the province takes place in eThekwini.
“There are lot of activities happening in and around this district.
“In this past financial year, 40% of our cases came from here, so if we can deal with the eThekwini problem, followed by uMgungundlovu, we would have won the war.
“It is more peaceful to live in uMzinyathi, Harry Gwala or uMkhanyakude districts than to live in eThekwini.
“eThekwini and uMgungundlovu account for the biggest numbers of illegal settlements, biggest number of liquor stores, biggest number of all the wrong things, such as unemployment and kids dropping out of school and wandering around the street to commit crime,” Mkhwanazi said.
Mkhwanazi controversially said statistics also show a disturbing trend around black men, suggesting that many crimes are committed by them. He said police are dealing with dangerous criminals who do not only steal, but also kill.
“On perpetrators, we feel that we must put this in light so that we can identify what is the problem because we need to analyse our problem.
“The problem we have is with black men in South Africa. We have a serious problem. We have the colours and races of the perpetrators we have arrested; out of a total of 60 000 criminals that we arrested between the ages of 16 and 25 in the past five years, 57 000 of them were black men.
“We are dealing with serious things. It is not criminals who steal but criminals that kill, so we are at war, so when we take the war to the criminals as the police (these) experts must give us space.
“This is a battleground, we are not negotiating. We are the leading province with murders; all this is public knowledge,” added Mkhwanazi.
Mkhwanazi also announced that the SAPS will spend R300 million to install security cameras in the Inanda, KwaMashu and Ntuzuma (INK) areas, north of Durban, to help fight crime in these areas.
Mbongeni Phewa, from the Inanda Community Police Forum (CPF), welcomed any initiative to drop the level of crime in the INK areas, saying it is out of hand.
“People are living in fear every day of getting robbed or stabbed. What is really concerning is that these people are now targeting CPF members.
“We have always said there should be more police presence in these areas. We are seeing what the police are doing in the province and we say they must keep it going to protect our communities,” Phewa said.
Meanwhile, KZN police spokesperson Colonel Robert Netshiunda revealed that police in the province had recovered and seized 313 firearms during province-wide operations which also saw the arrest of 11 003 suspects for various crimes last month.
The Mercury