This Council Speech by Cape Town Mayor, Geordin Hill-Lewis, was delivered on Thursday, 18 August 2022
Speaker,
City colleagues,
Members of the public and guests,
Members of the media,
Good Morning, Molweni, More, Assalamu alaikum, Shalom,
A special welcome to the delegation from Buffalo City Metro in the Eastern Cape, who have joined us to look at our EPWP best practice. It is wonderful to have you here with us in the Mother City.
We also welcome here for the first time the newly selected Junior City Mayor, Leah Tshotwana, and her colleagues from the Junior City Council, and we wish them all of the very best in their term.
Finally, Speaker, Cape Town is the proud host city of the 2023 Netball World Cup, now 344 days away. But even before that tournament, we have Cape Town teams showing what they can do. We congratulate the team from Simanyene High School in Nomzamo in the Strand who are now the national netball high school champions. Congratulations!
Speaker,
Last week, at the City’s annual Remembrance Day service, we honoured all fallen staff members across the law enforcement and emergency services.
It was incredibly moving to sing the old hymn “Abide with me” in memory of these courageous men and women who lost their lives in the line of duty, and in comfort for their families.
“Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes;
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies.
Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;
In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.”
Such apposite and powerful words.
Our deepest sympathies lie with each of these officers and their loved ones for the sacrifice they have made to keep others safe.
Yesterday, I visited Constable Akhona Damane of Metro Police South in hospital where he is recovering from a gunshot wound to his foot after bravely responding to gunshot fire by a gangster in Hanover Park. I am pleased to report that the prognosis is very positive and he is in good spirits. I am sure you will all join me in thanking him for bravely putting his body on the line, and wishing him a speedy recovery.
Speaker, August is Women’s Month, and our attention turns specifically to the plague of gender-based violence and what we, as a City, can do to help defeat gender-based violence and all violent crime.
We were all shocked and appalled at the gang rape of eight women filming a music video in Krugersdorp on the West Rand three weeks ago. It was a brutal reminder of how dangerous it is to be a woman in South Africa, that – in 2022 – women do not enjoy the same freedoms as men.
And, to Minister Cele, who said last week that one of these young women was “lucky” to have been raped by only one man: we say shame on you sir.
Minister Cele, nobody is lucky to be raped!
Closer to home, we were last week reminded that many women are not safe even with the people they are closest to. My heart goes out to the family of Siphokazi Silulo of Atlantis who was stabbed and burned to death, allegedly by her boyfriend.
[I would like to ask us all to observe a moment’s silence for Ms. Silulo, her family and every victim of gender-based violence].
As a man, as a father of a daughter, and as Mayor, I feel a sense of personal responsibility for making our society a safer place for all women.
As a man, it is just not good enough to blame other men when it comes to gender-based violence. And then do nothing.
As men, we must do much more to actively stop this violence.
And we must be proactive in rooting out those toxic practices that objectify women.
So, this message is for the men of this city.
When you hear your friends making sexist remarks, call them out on it.
When you see other men reduce women to sex objects, call them out on it.
And if you are a dad, or even if you are talking to or around young boys, remember that you are a role model to them. How you talk about women today will determine how they treat women tomorrow.
Because that is where gender-based violence starts. It starts when we men dehumanise women with our words and our actions.
We can only start to bring down gender-based violence if we, as men, change the way we think and talk about women.
Speaker, violent crime has its roots in society. And South Africa is a broken society.
Over the course of our country’s history, communities were broken up and family structures damaged. The last 30 years of democratic government has done little to repair that damage.
Every year we celebrate Freedom Day, but we must ask ourselves: how free are we when we live in fear of violent crime?
Under apartheid, people lived in fear of the government.
Now, under a failing national government, people live in fear of their fellow citizens.
In Cape Town, we are faced with a double whammy: not only is there a failure of policing leadership at a national level; there is a chronic under-resourcing of the South African Police Services (SAPS) in this province and in this city.
How is it acceptable that, over the past five financial years, the National Police Minister has decreased the number of SAPS officers allocated in 71% of the Western Cape’s police stations?
Speaker, a democratic state does not need to be a weak state.
On the contrary, in a democracy, citizens elect a government with the expectation that it will protect them from harm.
I was disgusted to read this week that Police Minister Bheki Cele has spent R1,5 billion on accommodation and R42 million on catering in the three years he has been in office. I am sure everyone here will agree that, instead of spending billions on hotels and food, the Minister should be using this money to make our crime-ravaged communities safer.
In this City, we have taken the decision that we will not be held hostage by the national Police Minister. If Mr Cele will not fulfil his democratic mandate to make the people of Cape Town safer, then we certainly will.
We need to do more – right now – to protect people from the gangs and violent criminals that steal, rape and murder with absolute impunity.
And so today I want to announce what we are doing to increase policing power in Cape Town.
When I was elected Mayor I pledged to make Cape Town safer by training and deploying hundreds of additional law enforcement officers, expanding neighbourhood watches, fully harnessing technology to fight crime, and fighting to expand municipal policing powers.
Speaker, I am pleased to say that we are making significant progress on every one of these promises.
Last Thursday, in Bishop Lavis, I was joined by the Premier of the Western Cape, Alan Winde, for the passing-out parade of a new deployment of LEAP (Law Enforcement Advancement Plan) officers.
To date, we have deployed 1 100 new officers in communities impacted by high crime rates, including Delft, Nyanga, Khayelitsha, Philippi, Hanover Park, Bishop Lavis, Mfuleni, Harare, Gugulethu, Kraaifontein, Mitchells Plain, Atlantis, Philippi East and Samora Machel.
Our local Law Enforcement has more than tripled its arrest rate in recent years due to increased City and Provincial Government investment, with 50% of these arrests being drug-related. As of 31 July 2022, LEAP officers have made 8 500 arrests overall since the first deployment in February 2020. Of the 12 murder hotspots where LEAP officers have been deployed, four of them – Gugulethu, Philippi East, Mitchells Plain and Elsies River – no longer feature among the top 30 murder hotspots in the country.
As a result of these interventions, violent crime in Cape Town is now decreasing in some of the most crime-affected areas of our city. And we intend to keep up the momentum by training and deploying more officers to the areas that need it most. The City has allocated a record R5,4 bn safety budget this year, with funding for 230 more officers and auxiliaries this year alone.
We will soon release details of the deployment of 100 Law Enforcement officers to the Cape Town CBD. Every day thousands of residents from communities across Cape Town come to the CBD to work, and this deployment will give the City a 24-hour policing presence in the Cape Town CBD.
We are not going to allow our city centre to degenerate into a cesspit of criminality as has happened in other cities around the country. Because, the simple truth is that, if you surrender the CBD to criminal elements, you kill investment, growth and jobs.
In the coming months, we will launch an 80-officer strong Facility Protection unit to protect key municipal buildings from vandalism, and our staff from violent attacks. This new team are currently undergoing their training, and we wish them well and look forward to the difference they will make.
In addition, our traffic services will soon see the implementation of the City’s 24 hour Highway Patrol Unit. This new unit will improve traffic service, reduce fatalities, and ensure that law and order is maintained on our roads.
Lastly, we are in the process of ensuring that all our trained Law Enforcement Officers are out in our communities protecting people from crime, and not sitting behind desks. This government will ensure that all admin jobs will be filled by admin clerks, freeing up our law enforcement officers to do what they are trained to do.
And, on the subject of training: over the next 3 years R66m has been budgeted for expanding the City’s law enforcement training college to produce even more well-trained officers. This includes the recruitment of 25 additional training staff to deliver on the expanded training needs of the City’s policing departments.
Speaker, the neighbourhood watches throughout our City are one of its biggest success stories. It has been shown that communities are safer when residents work together to fight crime, which is why we have budgeted R5,6 million for training and new equipment for neighbourhood watches across Cape Town. My programme of patrolling with neighbourhood watches continues and I look forward to joining the Belhar community next week.
Not only are neighbourhood watches highly effective in fighting crime, they are also a proving ground for volunteers who want to take their participation to the next level. Over the next five years, we will expand the Auxiliary Law Enforcement Service – with members mostly recruited from neighbourhood watches. The City aims to recruit, train and deploy an additional 600 volunteers over the next five years to bolster its current volunteer corps of 470.
Speaker, in his speeches, President Ramaphosa likes to talk about ‘Smart Cities’. I have just returned from the World Cities Summit in Singapore where city leaders from around the world showcased how they are using technology and data to solve complex challenges. I was pleased to see that Cape Town is already drawing on much of the global best practice that is available.
Now I am a firm believer that, when it comes to policing, there is no substitute for good old-fashioned boots on the ground. But I am more convinced than ever that technology can tip the scale in our favour as we work to win the war on crime. Technology gives us the means to develop and execute a truly integrated approach to make the most efficient use of the City’s limited resources.
Plans are underway to convert the City’s current Transport Management Centre in Goodwood into a fully-integrated Joint Services Operations Centre or JSOC. To use a biological analogy, the JSOC will become the ‘head’ of our policing operation – it is where our entire crime-fighting apparatus will be run from.
If the JSOC is to be the head, then the Emergency Police Incident Control or ‘EPIC’ software system will be the ‘brain’. EPIC will process data in real time to give our operational command team enhanced real-time situational awareness, and enable us to respond decisively and immediately to incidents as they occur.
The ‘eyes’ of the operation will be the various camera-based technologies including CCTV footage, remotely piloted and manned aircraft systems, automatic number-plate recognition technology, vehicle dash cams and body-worn cameras. These digital ‘eyes’ will constantly feed data back to our operational command, via the EPIC software system.
The ‘eyes’ will be augmented by the ‘ears’ – a network of audio sensors that detect when a shot is fired, precisely where it is fired and even the type of firearm used. Gunshot location data will help our police officers to deploy resources to gun crime hotspots, react quickly to gun crime when it occurs, and to help with prosecuting those who commit gun crime.
Speaker, on the subject of prosecution, it is common cause that the SAPS has a woeful conviction rate. Lost dockets, lack of evidence and corrupt officials are staple features of SAPS investigations, which is why so many criminals still roam our streets, terrorising communities. These failures give the many hard-working SAPS officers a bad name, and erode public trust in the police.
In the City of Cape Town, we are building our municipal police into a proper crime-fighting force. We are developing the policing power – through tech and boots on the ground – to make our communities safer.
But the truth is, Speaker, we need to do much more if we are to win the war on crime. And we want to do much more. It is not good enough for us to increase our policing power; we need to expand the powers of our city officers as well.
I think everyone here knows that devolution is an overarching policy position of this government. We are a capable government, and we are capable of achieving much more if the national government devolves more power to us.
Our Metro Police and Law Enforcement Officers do an incredible job, but they do not yet have all the powers envisaged in the Constitution to win the war against crime.
Specifically, our officers are limited to crime prevention in the main, with limited scope for criminal investigations. While we already use that existing scope to the full, and we are fully confident in our power to do so, we also want to do so much more.
By going beyond crime prevention, we could be doing so much more to help SAPS build prosecution-ready case dockets. Instead, our officers have to rely on an overwhelmed and under-resourced SAPS that, frankly, does not have the capacity to investigate crime properly.
A recent study found that 48% of SAPS detectives in the Western Cape have a caseload of over 200 dockets per officer. This is is 333% above the norm. This problem is compounded by the current shortage of more than 500 SAPS detectives in the province.
Between 1 April 2022 and 30 June 2022, a period of just three months, 198 cases serving before court were withdrawn because of SAPS inefficiencies. That is 198 cases that will never be tested by the law, 198 crimes where the perpetrators will simply walk free.
Fortunately, there is a practical, realistic, and workable solution. I can announce today that I have sent a formal request to Minister Cele to give the City’s police officers full crime-fighting powers, including the ability to investigate crime.
Minister Cele has previously said that he cannot devolve power in the absence of a constitutional amendment.
This is nonsense. Section 99 of the Constitution provides that “a Cabinet member may assign any power or function…to a Municipal Council.”
Accordingly, I have written to the Minister to request that he uses his constitutionally-enshrined power to give us the policing powers we need.
I was pleased to see President Ramaphosa’s remarks on Tuesday this week pledging to re-organise and strengthen law enforcement capacity across the board. With greater police powers granted by Minister Cele, we can help President Ramaphosa achieve his goal.
Speaker, let me be absolutely clear about what we want: We want our own, fully-fledged City police force with all the powers it needs to drastically reduce crime in Cape Town. And, if the Minister is not prepared to give us the powers we seek, we will fight tooth and nail to get them. We owe it to the millions of people in this City who live in fear of crime.
Speaker, on a final note, I am pleased to say that while we are cleaning up Cape Town of criminals, we are cleaning up in other ways too.
In two weeks from now, we will welcome the arrival of Spring and the start of what will become an annual Spring Clean campaign.
I will be sending out a letter to all Cape Town residents with a clear call-to-action:
As Mayor, I am calling on residents to help us spring clean our beautiful Mother City together!
I am calling on residents, schools, businesses, faith communities, and community groups to join the #SpringCleanCT campaign.
Let’s get our city looking sparkling clean and fresh this spring, including our parks, public spaces, beaches, rivers, and roads.
Let’s take pride in our city and show what’s possible when we unite as Team Cape Town.
And change is easy: First, none of us should ever litter! Then, each one of us can tell someone to stop littering, or to pick up their litter when we see them doing it. And each of us can take a few seconds to pick up some litter ourselves.
Together, we can keep our communities clean and put a stop to illegal dumping.
Send us pictures of the clean-ups you organise, along with the hashtag #SpringCleanCT, and we will share them far and wide on social media.
We can be a positive, powerful force for change when we take action together.
Thank you, Speaker.
Source: City Of Cape Town