Monday, February 17, 2025

FIRST WITH SECURITY NEWS

The City of Cape Town serious about tackling crime in all areas of the metro

Published on

A statement from the Cape Town metro states the “boots on the ground approach is paying off,” with authorities in the city for example apprehending a suspect in connection with tampering of the City’s electricity metering infrastructure.

Recent data shows a total of 242 infrastructure theft and vandalism incidents reported, with Area South being the most impacted, between April and June 2024. In that same period, some R7.3 million was spent by the City to fix theft and vandalised infrastructure, with the majority of that spent on repairing public lighting. This extreme crisis situation has led to the City putting many interventions in place to enable energy teams to fix infrastructure faster and also to reduce the risks of theft and vandalism, the City said.

The City has launched an anonymous tip off campaign called Let’s ACT, and is calling on Capetonians to report suspicious activity near infrastructure. More boots on the ground have been added through Energy Safety Teams, with funding increased to R40 million, aimed at addressing the crisis. Security escorts now accompany teams as they attend to outages caused by theft and illegal connections.

Long term solutions are underway, with the City looking at replacing the copper material in electrical infrastructure with aluminium, where possible, to reduce its street value. Further, the City is rolling out more underground cabling where feasible, increasing CCTV monitoring and looking at more innovative options, through enhanced engagements, education and awareness drives with communities across the metro.

“We thank our teams for their work and community members for their support. We can only protect our power if we work together,” said the City’s Energy Mayco Member, Alderman Xanthea Limberg.

This week, the City became a signatory to a cooperation agreement with the South African Police Service and the Western Cape Department of Police Oversight and Community Safety.

The agreement formalises a commitment by all three spheres of government to work together to improve safety in Cape Town for all residents, as outlined during a stakeholder engagement at the City Hall on Tuesday, 27 August.

The Safer Cities initiative was first introduced three years ago but failed to progress further. The City said it hopes this agreement will be the first step towards a blueprint for mutual aid and partnerships, and further, the sharing of up to date crime data and intelligence with City enforcement services. Additionally, the City hopes to utilise the investments made into policing, focusing on improving public safety in Cape Town and expanding on the areas where such partnerships already exist, aligning approaches to support and enhance economic performance within the City.

For years, the City’s enforcement agencies have worked in support of the police in some of the most vulnerable communities, and the Strategic Surveillance Unit (SSU) has availed its CCTV footage to SAPS investigators in aid of securing prosecutions. Further, the City provided access to data and intelligence from its gunshot detection technology, and expressed a commitment to share more resources, such as Information, Reconnaissance and Surveillance (ISR) technology, commonly referred to as “the Eye in the Sky.”

The City said it has also made investments in its human capital, notably through the LEAP project, and is confident that enforcement services staff can play a critical role in providing additional investigative capacity through Metro Police, the Safety and Security Internal Investigative Unit (SSIU) and the information management arm, SSIMS, to help improve prosecution rates.

There have been very positive developments since the appointment of the new Police Minister as part of the Government of National Unity, and the signing of the Cooperation agreement is evident of this progression, the City said, but added that it will still be vital for the implementation protocol to be concluded.

“The City is fully committed to the initiative and will continue advocating for the devolution of policing powers to local government, as provided for in the Constitution, as the most realistic and effective intervention in the fight against crime. The City management believes the Safety and Security Directorate has proven it can manage effective and ethical policing agencies.

“The City leaders hope that by awarding additional policing powers, they will be able to further assist in the fight against crime, and call on the National Minister to extend such powers, as part of this cooperation agreement,” it concluded.

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