Police in the Eastern Cape have made inroads in their efforts to quell rampant extortion and kidnappings since the launch of the provincial hotline in August.
The hotline was launched after incidents, especially in Nelson Mandela Bay and OR Tambo, which were identified as major contributors.
On Friday, the municipality, provincial government and national police signed a co-operation agreement to fight crime.
Addressing the media, police minister Senzo Muchunu said the signing of the agreement was a commitment that required all spheres of government to play an active role.
“All spheres of government are on one side against crime and we will use all resources available to us to ensure that people are safe in the communities,” he said.
“This agreement will tighten that space so that it’s no longer easy for criminals to operate.
“There's no criminal that will be ahead of us in anything. We want to catch them while they still contemplate committing a crime.”
Mchunu said reports had shown that some criminals behind the extortions and killings were youngsters.
“When we do our work and confront criminals we should not consider their age, even though we know that some are about 15.
“We need to treat them according to the destruction they cause in society and people’s lives because it’s what they deserve, otherwise the public won’t forgive us.”
Eastern Cape provincial police commissioner Major-General Nomthetheleli Mene, said they were in the lead when it came to extortions and kidnappings.
Mene announced that the police had killed six people in September in connection with extortion and kidnappings.
On Wednesday, police acted on information related to kidnappings in Keiskammahoek that led to four perpetrators being shot dead.
“We followed up on information that led us to Keiskamma, which seems to be the preferred spot for their [criminals’] safe houses.
“This time around we followed up on kidnappings and police were accosted by criminals who started shooting and our members fired back and they were fatally wounded.”
Mene said police had recovered three firearms and two stolen vehicles.
The day after that, police in Mthatha followed up on an anonymous call from the extortion hotline about a vehicle doing the rounds collecting protection fees.
“The hotline that we’ve established in the province is yielding positive results because the latest incident that happened in Mthatha came through the hotline via an anonymous caller.
“We were told there was this car that had been collecting money in a particular area.
“When the police approached, two suspects started shooting at them and our members retaliated. The two suspects were shot dead.”
Mene said they now had a direction of where to look when it came to extortions.
“We have an idea of what we’re looking for and where to check.
“We also have a direction to kidnappings, especially in these top crime contributors in our province, but our members are on the ground working hard.”
Premier Oscar Mabuyane said he was proud of the presence of police that was felt in the communities.
“We are hard at work to restore the dignity of the state.
“I’ve never celebrated death, but now I’ve learnt to smile when I hear the news about criminals who have been killed by the police
“People are now able to walk in the streets of Nelson Mandela Bay compared with a few months ago when criminals ran amok, thanks to the work of crime intelligence.”
Mabuyane said his only remaining issue was the need to protect the provincial fiscus and the infrastructure projects under way.
“We’ve never seen this windfall of infrastructure development. We still want the soldiers to camp on our borders to guard these catalytic projects so that police can focus on their work of guarding the citizens.”
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