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Provincial Rural Safety Court Watching Briefs Unit Launched

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Dear MyPE

The Democratic Alliance (DA) today launches a provincial Court Watching Briefs Unit in the Eastern Cape as a means to specifically assist victims and families of victims of farm attacks and to put those attackers behind bars.

The slaying of Mr Chrisjan van Niekerk, a blind farmer from Alexandria on 25 July, is the first case that the DA will be following in order to ensure that justice is served for this horrific crime.

The situation in our rural areas is now at crisis point, with a sharp rise in terrible attacks and murders in June and July. The horrific triple homicide in the Northern Cape a week ago has shaken the farming community nationwide.

The police’s most recent crime statistics for the period 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020 indicate that the Eastern Cape is one of the most dangerous provinces for farmers, with 12 murders being committed in 11 incidents on farms and small holdings.

The Watching Briefs initiative was introduced by the Department of Community Safety in the DA-led Western Cape to act in accordance with the Constitutional provisions contained in Section 206 (3) of the Constitution, which provides that every province is entitled to monitor police conduct and report inefficiencies. The Criminal Justice system is buckling in the face of rising crime and dismally low prosecution rates. Indeed, last year prosecution rates for serious offences were as low as 2%.

It will be approached as a method of assisting the various state entities, along with victims, to achieve, as unobtrusively as is possible, a quick, just outcome of any investigation or prosecution.

A watching brief can and should do the following:

  • monitor police conduct;
  • monitor the effectiveness and efficiency of the police service;
  • promote good relations between the police and the community;
  • assess the effectiveness of visible policing; and
  • liaise with the Shadow Cabinet member responsible for policing or prosecutions with respect to crime, policing and prosecutions.

What chance does a farmer have to see justice done if he, his family, a farm manager, a farmworker or a visitor to the farm is attacked or murdered?

With our Rural Safety Watching Briefs initiatives the DA hopes to improve those chances.

Farm attacks are terrorising our rural areas and as long as the attackers get away with their crimes, the horror is just going to continue. With this initiative, the DA seeks to ensure that criminals end up behind bars as soon as possible and the violence comes to an end.

I call on all South Africans to visit the DA’s websites at stopplaasaanvalle.co.za or stopfarmattacks.co.za and co-sign our open letter to President Ramaphosa, calling on him to address the plight of our farming communities.

Regards

Annette Steyn MP
DA Shadow Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development and Head of the DA Eastern Cape Court Watching Briefs Unit

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