Security agencies in South Africa are ready in the event of similar riots occurring in July 2021.
The country’s Deputy President, Mr. Paul Mashatile, stated that the government will not repeat what happened in 2021, when the security agencies did not expect that riots might break out, which affected KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.
These riots, which lasted for almost a week, destroyed the property of shops and firms in the country, property was looted and burned because there were sympathizers with the arrest of the former president of the country, Mr. Jacob Zuma, who is now the leader of the MKP party.
“We did not expect the riots of 2021. The intelligence was not up to the standard but now there is a big difference. We expect anything, we will be able to quickly identify the danger because there is a move made on the intelligence side in this country,” said Mashatile in response to questions from members of Parliament, yesterday.
More than 300 people died in these riots, more than 5,000 were arrested, and billions of rands of damage was caused to the economy.
The leader of Bosa, Dr. Mmusi Maimane, complained about the lack of police, saying that people are not safe since he was elected to Parliament.
“Why don’t the police go to protect the people but they are all over the Parliament?”
Mashatile said that the Parliament was burnt so they do not want this incident to happen again in the future.
“If there is a president of the country, security needs to be strengthened. There is a move to hire police officers to monitor crime in the country. We are worried about the rampant crime in the country,” he said.
He pointed out the importance of cooperation if there is to be a successful fight against crime in this country.
“In the past, there were committees to fight crime in the community. They helped a lot in this problem because the community is the one who knows the origin and existence of crime. Some of the things we need to bring back to fight crime.”
He said that the justice system must also be involved in the fight against crime so that someone is not arrested and released tomorrow.