Ian Cameron, Glynnis Breytenbach and Nicholas Gotsell at Atlantis Police Station this week. (Photo: X)
Enoch Godongwana, the minister of finance, made additional allocations to the South African Police Service in his budget speech this week and in the process recognized organized crime as a national priority.
“But money alone won’t stop bullets,” says Ian Cameron, DA MP and chairman of the parliamentary committee on police.
“R1 billion more is not going to change outcomes if basic operational failures are not addressed.
Shortly after the budget speech, Cameron visited the Atlantis police station in the Western Cape with Glynnis Breytenbach and Nicholas Gotsell, both DA MPs, to see for themselves how the police are responding to the latest outbreak of taxi-related violence.
This after a mass shooting in Atlantis claimed the lives of a 14-year-old girl and a taxi driver on the same day as the budget speech.
However, this shooting was not an isolated incident, says Cameron.
“This follows several recent shooting incidents with multiple victims in the same area, all linked to an escalating taxi conflict.
“The pattern is clear. The killings are becoming more and more shameless. Communities are living under siege.”
Cameron therefore believes that the real test after this year’s budget speech will not be whether violence is temporarily kept in check, but whether organized taxi-related criminal networks will be destroyed and more perpetrators will be found guilty.
Ian Cameron, Glynnis Breytenbach and Nicholas Gotsell at Atlantis Police Station this week. (Photo: X)
“Increased allocations must strengthen crime intelligence, rebuild forensic capacity and entrench prosecution-driven investigations. Because increased visibility without dismantling criminal networks will not protect communities.
This week’s shooting in Atlantis exposes this gap, says Cameron.
“If there was credible intelligence about increasing taxi tensions, why were proactive disruptions not carried out?” he wants to know. “Why haven’t taxi ranks been stabilized through targeted operations? Why aren’t the main instigators neutralized through coordinated investigations?”
Cameron then argues that the army’s deployment in the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and Gauteng may provide short-term stabilization, as soldiers can stand their ground, “but they cannot manage informant networks, manage complex organized crime investigations or secure sustainable convictions,” he says.
“Structural reform within the SAPS and the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigations (the Hawks) remains the real requirement.
“A young girl lost her life on Wednesday, and the senseless deaths of people like this cannot continue,” says Cameron.
“The state’s constitutional duty is clear: protect the innocent. That duty cannot be fulfilled by budget announcements and deployments alone. It requires intelligence-led policing, prosecution-driven investigations and operational competence that matches the sophistication of organized crime.”