DA reports Rosettenville SAPS to IPID
13 February 2017
The DA has today written to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) to investigate growing evidence of SAPS involvement in multiple illegal activities in Rosettenville, Johannesburg.
The DA will also request the suspension of all officers who are known to allegedly be involved, pending further investigation. This will require that SAPS officers be temporarily transferred to Mofatt View Police Station in Rosettenville, until IPID’s investigation is complete.
Evidence from community members shows that the ongoing criminal activities in Rosettenville are clearly continuing with the cooperation, or at least the inattention, of multiple corrupt SAPS members. IPID must now investigate any breach of duty by the SAPS, and must take remedial steps to get the Rosettenville SAPS working again for the community.
The community alleges that drug and prostitution crimes have been allowed to continue unabated because police officials stationed at Rosettenville, Mofatt View Police Station, are on the payroll of local criminal kingpins. It is not unusual for drug and organised crime heavyweights to pay police off to evade law enforcement. The IPID must investigate this very real possibility in Rosettenville.
The community has also consistently told the DA that despite supplying all requisite information and leads against these kingpins to the local SAPS, no action has ever been taken.
After Rosettenville’s crime issue gained national media attention this week, and Mayor Herman Mashaba led an effort to crack down on crime in the area, on Wednesday, 7 February 2017, the local ward councillor for Rosettenville, Michael Crichton of the DA, received a threatening phone call from one of the apparent local criminal kingpins warning him to stop his interference in their operations.
It is clear that the crime syndicates operating in Rosettenville are growing increasingly uncomfortable of the crack down on crime by the DA government of Mayor Herman Mashaba, and any SAPS protection of these syndicates must now be exposed and eliminated.
The DA will continue to press for safer communities in South Africa. Where the DA governs, we crack down on crime, and we work to make residents safer.
The SAPS must not be allowed to protect or turn a blind eye to criminal syndicates in our communities.
Issued by Manny de Freitas, DA Constituency Head: Johannesburg South, 13 February 2017
