Frustrated and angry residents from Grassy Park, Ottery and Parkwood picketed outside the Grassy Park Police Station on Wednesday night 20 April, demanding the removal of station commander Col Dawood Laing.
The community said they had enough of the gang shootings and deaths of innocent people.
Organiser of the event, Pastor Paul Philips, a community leader from Ottery, handed over a memorandum of demands to Nyanga cluster commander Maj Gen Sizakhele Dyantyi outside the station.
“We have drawn a line in the sand, we have exhausted all means of communication and we are now at the stage where the community must decide which route and way we are going to go.
“We are going to do what we need to do. We are at the lowest point of relations with police. The colonel wants to be the boss, the colonel wants to dictate, the colonel wants to do whatever he wants to do apart from what he is supposed to do. We can’t work with leaders like that,” said Philips.
He claimed that there is no relationship between community structures and the station commander.
“To address crime and gangsterism and the shootings, we need a partnership and if there is no partnership, we are here to tell them that he must be removed so that we can formulate an actual partnership to address the issues in our community.”
In the memorandum residents demanded the removal of the Grassy Park station commander; a total “clean out” of staff at the police station, immediate crime interventions to address the daily shootings and high crime rate in the Grassy Park precinct, that Ottery be declared a red zone, that immediate resources are activated to address the situation in Ottery to prevent further bloodshed and that satellite police points be established in Ottery and Parkwood Estate as emergency measures.
Melanie Arendse, a community leader from Ottery, said in the past seven months there have been innocent lives lost in gang violence.
“Seven months ago we lost a child of four-years-old and another guy in Ottery. We have requested for a nyala vehicle to be placed on the field and our request was not adhered to and since then we have had five deaths.
“We are going to ask for the removal of the station commander and we have the right to come in front of this place and to hand over a memorandum.”
Arendse said that police served a large area which is why the community is demanding a satellite police station.
“We want a satellite station in the volatile areas. They service a big area and national government needs to for now place visible police in areas where there is gangsterism.”
She further claimed that residents were left to cordon-off the streets in their neighbourhood to keep gang members out.
“We had to cordon off our own areas so that the drive-by shootings could stop. The drive-by shootings then stopped because they couldn’t come into our areas anymore. So what measure do we have to take before this commander starts listening to the people.”
Anthea Lewis, a resident from Ottery, said while innocent people are dying police are nowhere to be seen.
“I’m here tonight because of the killings taking place in our area and police are never visible. We asked for a meeting with police. They did not come out and as we called for a meeting to take place innocent people are being killed.
“We are a gatvol (fed-up) community with the violence going on in Ottery Side A.”
Lewis added that five people had been shot dead in a short period of time.
“It was Monique and Marvin, Saayed a 17-year-old boy and children are having guns pointed at them on their way to school.”
The mom says her teenage son is too afraid to go to school after a gang member threatened his life.
“My 12-year-old son goes to Perivale Primary School. One of the Mongrels (gang member) confronted him and said to him if they can’t get his brother, they will get him. He is a primary school (learner) and ever since then he has been at home and does not go to school. I’m too scared to send him to school.”
Merle Barghus, also from Ottery, said police do not care about the community.
“All they (police) do is collect dead bodies and that’s it. They don’t care about our community and you don’t see them when there is a shooting. Show your visibility when the schools go out and when the children go to school. You don’t see them at all.”
Provincial police spokesperson Col Andrè Traut said police have taken note of the community’s concerns.
“Police management in the province has taken cognizance of the concerns raised by the community and due process is being followed,” he said, adding: “The protest action was initiated by the community’s concern regarding crime levels in the area, and supposed corruption at the station.”
Traut added that Public Order Police (POP) and other law enforcement agencies were deployed to ensure that law and order was maintained.
Meanwhile, on Thursday 21 April police arrested a 38-year-old man in connection with a murder in Grassy Park.
“In their endeavour to bring stability to areas affected by gang related crime, police members of the Anti-Gang Unit, POP, and Grassy Park assisted by other law enforcement agencies were deployed in the Grassy Park area last night for a joint operation.
“The AGU detectives also searched for those responsible for the murder of a 33-year- old man who was shot and killed in Strandfontein Road on 19 April. Investigations led the operation to a residence where four suspects were arrested and brought in for questioning,” said Traut.
“Interrogation of the suspects resulted in the detention of a 38-year-old male for the murder. The other three were released as they could not be positively linked to the crime.”
The suspect is due to make his first court appearance in the Wynberg Magistrates’ Court.
