341 Murders in March – Emergency Measure Needed

Minister of Community Safety, Alan Winde says the Western Cape’s murder rate continues to be alarmingly high, despite the Minister of Police, Bheki Cele claiming that their “interventions are yielding success.”

In March 2019, 341 people were murdered, compared to 343 in March 2018.

Between 1 November 2018, the day before the anti-gang unit was launched, and 31 March 2019, 1567 have been murdered in the Western Cape.

This is according to the provincial Health Department’s mortuary statistics.

Western Cape Minister of Community Safety, Alan Winde, said: “Minister Cele’s leadership has not moved the needle on ten murders per day in our province, yet he claims there is no need for any further intervention. He can easily say this because he sits in his comfortable office in Pretoria, 1500km away from the issues we face. Minister Cele should remove his blinkers and start to address our crisis immediately.”

Of the murders in March 2019, 140 people died as a result of fatal shootings, and 152 as a result of sharp objects. Death from sharp objects increased substantially year-on-year, from 138 in March 2018.

Said Winde: “As with the previous figures, I will raise these with Minister Cele. It’s become crystal clear that the current police strategies are not effective.

I would like to reiterate to Minister Cele that our offer of R5 million to reignite the police reservist programme, is still available. The offer of our own employees as Commissioners of Oaths, is also on the table awaiting police management go ahead.

We urgently need the Minister’s green light on these matters, so that we can increase police patrols in our worst affected communities, but I don’t expect it will come.

What we need is close lines of accountability, the ability to respond to local conditions more rapidly, and to unbundle the mess that the national Minister has made. We need to decentralise the police service, and take it away from the ANC, to build a #SaferWesternCape.”