Police Minister Senzo Mchunu said parts of the country face a “wave of extortion and other related crimes”, with Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Western Cape and Eastern Cape accounting for 73% of all reported crimes.
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South Africa must declare war on the construction and extortion mafias that use violence to hold citizens and businesspeople hostage to their demands for cash in exchange for contracts and personal protection.
This was the unequivocal agreement across all political parties during a parliamentary debate on the construction mafia and rampant extortion after Police Minister Senzo Mchunu outlined the South African Police Services (SAPS) plan of action to deal with the criminals.
Mchunu said parts of the country face a “wave of extortion and other related crimes”, with Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Western Cape and Eastern Cape accounting for 73% of all reported crimes.
“Extortion [has] been emerging over time and it has now reached levels where all communities in our country beyond the four provinces have become very angry, bitter and agitated,” Mchunu said.
“The pain has gone very deep. The mood expressed in communities all around the country is also reflective of statements made in the house unanimously against these crimes in the short past. The current socio-economic conditions are militating against low crime levels in the country and need to be addressed urgently by this house and also by the executive.”
He said the modus operandi of the perpetrators of extortion was well known. “They are often armed, operating in groups and instilling fear and chaos. The relative silence of communities and low reporting is often due to these fears.”
Mchunu said police were “hard at work” fighting these crimes daily and had recently, following intelligence, clashed with extortionists during an operation in Milnerton, Cape Town. Four suspects were killed in the shootout with police and four were injured, while two fled the scene.
He said in the Eastern Cape police were focusing operations to fight extortion in Mthatha and Nelson Mandela Bay, as well as the illegal occupation of buildings and stock theft.
“We are seeing shocking incidents of lowest morality where church services and funerals and other family related functions get disrupted by these extortionists,” he said.
Police in Mpumalanga had arrested three suspects for extortion. In Gauteng, three people were arrested in Bronkhorstspruit for extortion and police were also aware of cases in Soweto.
“In the Free State, the target of extortionists include pensioners … generally, there’s more extortion going on in the communities than meets the eye. We have to improve intelligence. We have to find information on our own in terms of profiling these criminals, because communities do report, but not enough,” Mchnunu said.
He said his ministry and the SAPS had signed an operational plan with the City of Cape Town to tackle crime which involved working with community policing forums, city police and private security companies. This alignment would help in terms of resources.
His department will meet government leaders in Gauteng on Thursday and KwaZulu-Natal later this month.
“We’re also holding a series of meetings with the state department, with sister departments, on collaboration against crime,as per the National Integrated Crime Prevention Strategy,” Mchunu said.
MPs urged the minister to take a tough stance against extortion, which they said had left citizens fearing for their lives. They also raised concern that in some cases the police were complicit in the extortion, leaving citizens “truly helpless”.
Extortion is a “rapidly escalating threat that affects every single layer of society … from large corporations to smaller township businesses and even our schools”, Democratic Alliance MP Ian Cameron said.
“It is deeply rooted and it’s an issue that is jeopardising economic stability and tears at the social fabric of every single part of our country, and it has become a national crisis,” he added.
Economic Freedom Fighters MP Mbuyiseni Ndlozi alleged that some police officers work with extortionists, which is why they claim they cannot identify suspects.
“The reason the police are claiming ignorance is because the police are embedded. It is because correctional services are embedded,” he said.
Build One South Africa MP Mmusi Maimane said citizens lived in fear and “when they call the police, sometimes police don’t show up, and when the police do show up, sometimes they are demanding bribes themselves”.
“I’m here to say to you, we cannot afford another talk. What we’ve got to be doing here today is making a declaration of war on crime,” he said.