MMC in new move to enhance public safety
09 March 2017
The City of Johannesburg on Wednesday March 8 launched a Public Safety Forum at Marks Park in Emmarentia in Region B in a new bid to enhance the safety of its residents.
Spearheaded by Member of Mayoral Committee for Public Safety Cllr Michael Sun, the forum will be re-evaluating safety measures, by-law management, traffic management, fire rescue services, ambulance services and disaster management. The initiative also aims to find unique strategies for each and every problem discussed.
“The purpose of this forum is to pick up all the general issues that cut across all wards in the regions. These include issues that the councillors will raise during the forum. We have also seen that some of the issues are ward-specific and we need to find unique solutions for every ward,” said Cllr Sun.
This forum followed the recent spate of violence that rocked Rosettenville, southeast of Johannesburg, where at least 10 homes were torched by angry residents in retaliation to a wave of criminal activities that included drug dealing, prostitution and building hijacking. During the incidents, community members blamed the wave of criminality on undocumented people.
Johannesburg Executive Mayor Cllr Herman Mashaba intervened and called on the residents not to take the law into their own hands.
“Such acts are not acceptable. They will not do us justice. We have to prevent them because we do not want to have a lawless city,” Mayor Mashaba said at the time.
Launching the safety forum on Wednesday March 8, Cllr Sun said the initiative would involve all councillors and would seek to find out how the existing Joburg 10 Plus safety strategy could be re-engineered.
The Joburg 10 Plus strategy brings metro policing closer to communities ward-based deployments. Its aim is to strengthen engagements with communities on policing issues through existing partnerships and structures such as community policing forums (CPFs).
“We are finding out from the councillors what could work in their various constituencies and what is failing them,” Sun said.
“After listening to their concerns, we will begin the process of profiling the regions and their clusters according to problems in the wards. After that we will be looking at their problems individually to find their unique solutions,” said Cllr Sun.
“We cannot use a one-size-fits-all method because we will be deploying already very limited resources. We need to be innovative in resolving the problems because we can already see that old solutions are failing us.”
Cllr Sun said communities needed to be more sensible and co-operative in their approach to crime and not to think that safety is the responsibility of the government alone.
“Once we have that mindset we will not have to enforce by-laws of the City but only deal with management issues. This is the point we are driving our communities and our city to,” said Cllr Sun.