'The Cape Flats is a crime scene'

"The Cape Flats is a crime scene.”

This was the message to police bosses and government from prominent Mitchells Plain crime fighters and community leaders. 

With gun violence and gang-related crime plaguing Cape Flats communities, residents are losing faith in the police’s ability to fight back and the justice system to keep residents safe.  

Chairperson of the Lentegeur Community Policing Forum (CPF) Michael Jacobs said: “Sector policing is out the window. We are struggling with vehicles, and in some cases, we have none. Without resources, the link between the police and the community is broken. 

“We cannot just blame the station commander when they don’t have the tools to do their job.

“I am disappointed in the provincial commissioner. You said on TV there were only a few incidents, but every day, people are dying in Mitchell’s Plain. You cannot run a station with fewer members than the population it must serve, and you cannot keep taking members from one station to cover another,” he said.

Jacobs then took aim at the justice system, adding: “How can someone get R500 bail for a shooting while shoplifters sit three months in Pollsmoor (prison)?

“Youngsters caught with drugs reoffend because they are not sent to proper programmes. Schools have become recruitment hubs for gangs, yet we have only one social worker for more than 75 schools in this precinct.”

Pastor Leon Jacobs, founder of the Leon Jacobs Foundation, said modern gangs operate as businesses and more and more youngsters are seeing criminal activity as an income, as South Africa’s jobs crisis worsens. 

According to Jacobs, gangs are paying young recruits up to R4 000 a month to help secure their territory and build dependence on illicit money. 

He called on religious leaders to help laaities see the light.

He said: “The church must be present. We are the last hope — offering safety, space, and guidance in these troubled times.”