Lets Blackball Crime

Lets Blackball Crime Before It Whitewashes Us

Expatriates start to lobby for change in SA
Expatriates have put a new spin on crime in South Africa. They have begun doing the right thing from the leftist ranks to raise the profile of a blotted crime sheet that has sullied our spectacular transition to democracy.
Crime has touched the hearts of all races. Almost everyone knows someone who tells a real-life story of a hijacking, smash-and-grab, murder, rape, housebreaking, armed robbery and petty theft.
In the past year, almost 150 police officers have been killed in the line of duty. The daily murder toll of 50 and 350 acts of violent crimes has turned the “Darling of Democracy” into the top three violent-country status behind Iraq and Colombia.
Against this black canvas of shocking statistics, its time to give crime a bad name and hang it.
Under apartheid’s police state, crime was worse, but it just got better under post-apartheid democracy. The legacy of a violent society continues to haunt us.
There are a range of organizations and agencies that have joined the anti-crime lobby, but more action, especially vocally, is needed to collar this scourge that bedevils a highly successful and vibrant society, as epitomised by Johannesburg, SA’s New York.In June 2007, the national annual crime statistics from April 2006 to March 2007, revealed: murder across SA increased by 2.4% (19,202); home invasions up by 25.4% (12,761); motor vehicle hijackings up by 6% (13,599); aggravated robbery up slightly (92,021); business robbery up by 6.5% (6,689); cash in-transit robbery up by 21.9% (467); and bank robbery doubled (129).
Before he was gunned down violently in a Durban restaurant, building contractor Marc Joubert appealed to his expatriate friends to raise their voices against crime. In a knee-jerk reaction, hundreds gathered in London’s high streets to highlight crime, putting a new focus on how to make a powerful statement on this issue through world exposure.
Before that Charles Nqakula, Safety and Security Minister, who told people complaining about the country’s rampant crime rate to “pack your bags and go”, landed in London where he assured expatriate groups that he had declared a war on crime.
In his controversial budget speech spat with opposition MPs in Parliament who had been vocal about SA becoming the crime capital of the world, Nqakula said: “The whingers )complainers) can do one of two things. They can continue to whinge until they are blue in the face … they can be as negative as they want to … or they can simply leave this country."
Apologetically, he later straightened the record: "I must admit I was a bit surprised when what I had said and done had been brought into the public domain in a way which was not intended by me in the first place."
In the UK, he said the legacy of apartheid, widespread poverty and social breakdown had resulted in SA experiencing one of the highest rates of crime in the world.
“I do want to admit right at the outset that the crime levels in South Africa are high. Crime has fallen but not as dramatically as we would have wished.”
According to SA diplomats, 400 000 Britons visited SA every year and all, but a handful emerged unscathed.
The clarion call, therefore, is for all stakeholders to raise the ugly head of crime at a higher pitch.
With this in mind, I joined the KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Community Safety and Liaison, Bheki Cele, on some of his out-of-town anti-crime road shows that brought me face to face with Safety and Security Minister, Charles Nqakula.
Speaking to stakeholders, police and community near the Mozambican border recently, where ordinary folks have become victim of the cross-border activities of gangs and thieves, the Minister preached a different gospel from his parliamentary parlance, instructing his police to adopt a “shoot to kill” attitude if they reasonably believed they were going to be shot at or attacked by a suspect. He is not mincing his words.
Government alone cannot fight crime. The people can help blackball the monster.

Marlan Padayachee is an independent freelance journalist in South Africa. This article was first published in Juluka in the United States and www.reporters.co.za in South Africa.