MEC Fritz welcomes provincial enforcement work

The Western Cape Minister of Community Safety, Albert Fritz, today welcomes news of a number of visible policing successes the Law Enforcement Advancement Programme, which aims to enhance visible policing. 

Over the past seven days, 7610 persons were searched in the ten crime hot spots in the Cape Metro, including 1071 in Nyanga; 829 in Delft; 856 in Phillipi and 786 in Kraaifontein. 957 vehicles and 349 houses were also searched in these crime hot spots. LEAP Officer conducted 119 joint operations with SAPS, as well as 121 autonomous operations and 47 operations with other City forces. A total of 84 people were arrested over the seven-day period for possession of drugs, unlicensed firearms, imitation firearms, dangerous weapons and other offences.

In addition to 6 illegal firearms and ammunition, 17 knives, a panga and an axe; 914 full mandrax tablets, 58 half tablets, 6 quarter tablets and 5 crushed tablets were confiscated. 4kg, 3 packets, 1 parcel and 67 stoppe of dagga were confiscated and an undisclosed amount of dagga was found. 62 packets of tik and 11 units of heroine were also confiscated.

Minister Fritz said, “a pattern of consistency has emerged in this excellent work rate on the part of our LEAP Officers. The objective of LEAP is to increase visible policing, and searching 7610 people over a seven-day period is visible policing. Look at the amount of confiscations of drugs and dangerous weapons. That is visible policing. And so I want to thank all of those involved in LEAP and I want to encourage them to keep up the excellent work.”

The Minister says that LEAP’s consistent success in visible policing can be carried over to other areas of policing, and this is why he is calling for greater policing responsibility for the Province.

Minister Fritz continued, “we want to bring the same kind of success that we are seeing in visible policing to other areas in the police service, such as DNA testing for example. The Forensic Science Laboratory is in crisis. Many months and R250 million after announcing a turnaround plan, the backlog is still growing. The National Minister is evidently incapable of solving the crisis. We have reached out to the National SAPS on a number of occasions already because we want to help. To be honest, I can’t believe that we are being blue-ticked on this crucially important issue. But the point is that the Western Cape Government wants to assist in improving the services that SAPS renders to citizens by, for example, fixing the DNA backlog; and that is why we are calling for the Western Cape Government to be given more policing responsibility.”

Minister Fritz concluded, “we are very proud of our LEAP Officers and the work they are doing. They are central to the success we have had as a province, and it is that success that confirms our resolve to adopt greater policing responsibility for the safety of all our citizens.”