Pimville Crime Prevention Committee leaders called a meeting over the weekend to discuss the issue of crime in their area and surrounding neighborhood’s. The community leaders are set to strategically fight crime in their communities.

According to Statista, contact crimes in South Africa include violent crimes such as murder, attempted murder, sexual offence, assault, and robbery. In the fiscal year 2022/2023, Johannesburg had the highest number of contact crime incidents. In 2023, June, July, and December experienced the highest number of household robberies.

The Gauteng Legislature’s Portfolio Committee on Community Safety released a statement welcoming and congradulating the Gauteng Police as well as Law Enforcement Agencies in the Province for achieving a significant decrease in overall crime during the 1^st quarter of the 2024/25 financial year. 

The committee further adds that the stats show a reduction of 4,709 counts as compared to the same period in the previous year, resulting in a 4.5% decrease in overall crime. In April-June 2024, Gauteng had 65,445 arrests, with 11,688 of those being illegal immigrants. The province reduced 16 of the 17 community reported crimes; a total of 1,492 firearms and 1.968 kg of drugs were recovered.

Do these stats represent what’s happening on the ground?

In the meeting that was held in the Pimville community centre, all the members agreed that they’re under siege by criminals who break into their houses.

Clayton, a community leader, said, “We can’t defeat crime when we are divided.” He further adds that mothers and grandmothers should stop protecting their children who indulge in nyaope and criminal activities.

Clayton further adds that there’s no unity amongst patrollers and the Community Policing Forum, which makes it hard to coordinate efforts to work towards a common goal.

Pimville community members have alleged that Kliptown police station service is poor. One of the community members alleges that they were a housebreak in at 23:00 and the cops came at 9:00 in the morning; that’s a 10-hour gap before the police arrived at the crime scene.

Community leaders add that the police station was given ten cars, and whenever community members need assistance, they are told that there are no cars. They add that there’s a challenge with the case backlog and the lack of SAPS giving the community updates on cases. It is also alleged that some dockets are missing and the police station doesn’t have a phone.

Kliptown Police Station Colonel Sithebe says, “The issue of the cars, he explained it to the community.” Mr. Sithebe further adds that the cases are updated by the machine; when you open a case, you get detailed updates informing you that the case is opened and who is investigating your case; when your matter goes to court, you get an update. He further cites that this differs member by member; you might find that to others it does happen where you don’t receive updates provided they shared their contact details.

Colonel says, “They are addressing this issue as station management; it is the duty of every investigative officer to keep people updated with their cases.”.

Kliptown Police Station has a service delivery box; if you’re not satisfied, you can write a letter and mention who was on duty on the day you received bad service. There’s a committee that is delegated to inform us about what the community is saying; the committee is led by Captain Ngwenya. The box is checked on Mondays.

There are five police stations in Soweto that don’t have a landline; it’s due to a contract issue, done by the province, and currently busy with a new contract.

Mr. Sithebe cites that the missing dockets must be reported provincially.