It is truly laughable that Tony Ehrenreich and his like-minded COSATU members are ‘astounded' at me doing my job!
Never one to let the facts get in the way of good politicking, Mr Ehrenreich seems to believe that uttering the same tired inaccuracies time and again will eventually convince people that he speaks truth.
Mr Ehrenreich, you underestimate the residents of Cape Town. Your consistent misinformation has lost you all credibility and the people that live in our city have largely seen right through your thinly veiled political agenda.
Yet again, I will explain the basic workings of local government to Mr Ehrenreich. It is my job to enforce bylaws. This includes such things as road safety. It is because this competency belongs to the City administration that the road accident rate has come down year on year since 2006.
This equates to over 1000 lives saved due to a number of interventions - including clamping down on those who speak on their phones whilst driving. Where Cape Town runs issues directly, we succeed, but where we are dependent on challenges run by national government, like dealing with the gangs, we struggle.
It is also not either road safety or gang violence, it is both. In other words, unlike Mr Ehrenreich, this administration is not limited to dealing with one thing at a time - we can multi-task.
The upsurge in gang violence across the Cape Metropole is indeed an issue that deserves urgent intervention.
Crime prevention and fighting gangs is not however within the City of Cape Town's mandate. It is exclusively a SAPS competency. Unfortunately, statistics acquired from SAPS and the Justice Ministry points to a conviction rate for gang violence that is 12% or lower; between 2 and 5% in some areas. May I suggest that Mr Ehrenreich's time would be more constructively spent by having some candid conversations about this dire shortcoming with his colleagues at national government?
Because SAPS is found wanting in terms of its core function, and as part of this administration's commitment to building a safe city for our residents, we have continued to go beyond our mandate and find innovative solutions to this scourge as well as assisting SAPS as far as our resources allow.
The efforts of this administration and the Western Cape government to secure appropriate interventions are well-documented. Attempts to discuss the latest upsurge in violence with Senior Western Cape SAPS management have come to nought. If SAPS does have any planned interventions, the City is not aware of them.
It is however clear that we cannot sit by idly while the situation continues to go unchecked.
A week ago, the City's Metro Police Department launched ‘Operation Punch'. In the space of six days, officers carries out numerous search and seizure operations, resulting in 56 arrests and the seizure of more than 700 units of narcotics, two firearms and more than R20 000 in cash.
One of those arrested was a SAPS detective who faces charges of possession and dealing in illegal narcotics, possession of an unlicensed firearm and ammunition, being in possession of forensic bags with narcotics, possession of an unlicensed vehicle, corruption and defeating the ends of justice.
‘Operation Punch' will be expanded into a fully-fledged gang task force. This will include a number of internal and external specialists to ramp up and expand the City's gang operations in addition to the 28 million rand this administration has already spent. The task force has already held preliminary meetings and will be formally constituted next week.
This administration will continue doing what it can to improve the lives of its residents. Mr Ehrenreich can get on board and help us to end a scourge that has plagued our communities for so long. But I doubt he will.
Ald. Smith is the Mayoral Committee Member for Safety and Security in the City of Cape Town
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