The Hanover Park Area Based Team (ABT) launched on Friday 1 December will see an integrated approach to crime fighting.
Andile Zabeko, who is part of the Department of Health and Wellness’ violence prevention unit and the ABT co-ordinator, says: “The Department of Health has identified certain high crime areas, including Hanover Park. In the strategy of dealing with crime, working in silos is not helping. It was very important that we break these silos and get all the organisations together, including the community NPOs,” he says.
Coinciding with World Aids Day, free HIV testing was available at Freedom Square. The event also featured a motorcade drive-about through the streets of Hanover Park with senior police officials.
Philippi police have taken the lead in the establishment of this team.
Station commander Col Adriaan Saulse says the ABT has been a while in the making, pending the elections of the Community Policing Forum (CPF).
“The ABT was a project getting all the people together. People only look at crime, but it is a problem starting from a young age,” he says.
An integrated approach addressing social ills outside of just the crime is key to broaching the crime and violence plaguing the community.
“We want to take a holistic approach,” he says.
This will be the first of several events.
The ABT will meet once a month.
By working together, the sharing of data from the department clinics around high crime areas will also inform policing of identified hot spots.
Avril Andrews of the Alcardo Andrews Foundation says it is important for NGOs and government departments to join together.
“We all need each other. Our children are falling through the cracks and if we are connected with each other and work together, we can save so many lives. I think for the amount of gender-based violence (GBV) and gang violence that is going on and families being broken and lost through all this evil, we need to put all our differences aside and work together,” she says. “Gender-based violence is huge in our community and it is very hurtful to see the suffering of our people in our communities.”
The ABT includes City safety and security authorities, the provincial departments of health and wellness and social development, police oversight, correctional services, liquor authorities, NGOs, police and safety structures among others.
ABT is the umbrella body for all the community organisations.
Community policing forum deputy chair Weldon Cameron says as representatives and conduit to government services for the community (and precinct), it is paramount to join integrated initiatives like these.
“The departments we have here today have a targeted approach to address GBV and because of that we only saw it fitting to launch our 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children Campaign with all these departments, so that they can also introduce themselves to the community,” he says,
