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Metro police farce a dangerous and irresponsible political ploy

By

Ald Smith
Ald. Smith speaks with Nathan Koraan, father of Antonio Nino Koraan, who was shot and killed in Gelvandale in December 2015. DA community leader, Charlene Davids in the background.

Dear MyPE

The supposed launch of the metro police on 30 April 2016, will not deliver a metro police force, but will put metro security and traffic enforcement personnel into metro police uniforms and send them into the Bay’s most gang-ridden communities, without training, protection or adequate support. This is a dangerous and irresponsible political ploy, by Danny Jordaan.

So far all Mayor Jordaan has managed to unveil is borrowed vehicles at a glitzy event, with absolutely no officers on the beat. Now the Mayor plans to do more of the same, except this time he is placing additional lives at risk by putting traffic officers into the firing line of some of the city’s most dangerous and hardened gangsters.

Observations by The City of Cape Town’s Mayoral Committee Member for Safety and Security, Alderman JP Smith, on a visit today to Nelson Mandela Bay, has revealed Mayor Jordaan’s administration has not got the most basic preparation in place to launch a metro police force.

What is needed are well-equipped metro police headquarters, comprehensive combat, defence and firearm training, proper vehicle and equipment procurement and branding, and the hiring and screening of additional personnel.

Jordaan’s lack of readiness for any “launch” shows that he is intending to fool the people of Nelson Mandela Bay. It is clear that Jordaan is following in the footsteps of a compromised Jacob Zuma, who is also trying to fool the people of South Africa.

Ald. Smith was alarmed to hear that the Jordaan administration plans to launch the Metro Police on 30 April 2016 despite a recent report to the safety and security portfolio committee having revealed that only 10% of the work had been done to get the service off the ground.

As a result, the Metro now plans to send traffic officers in metro police uniforms into some of the most dangerous areas in the Metro without as much as a stitch of training.

Under the DA, the City of Cape Town has had a comprehensive Metro Police service operational for over a decade. With multiple specialised units and intelligence-driven operations, gang-related shootings have been reduced by 20%, and confiscation of illegal weapons has increased ten-fold under DA governance.

Without diluting its traffic police service, as Jordaan’s metro police farce aims to do here in NMB, the City of Cape Town is surging ahead with its fight against gangsterism and crime, aided by over 20 community tip-offs every week.

Using this best practice, a DA government in Nelson Mandela Bay will immediately begin formulating a plan to establish a metro police service that works alongside social and economic development, and early childhood development, to ensure that we finally begin to turn the tide on gangsterism and crime.

Regards

Athol Trollip

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Port Elizabethan

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