Gang-busting efforts in city scaled back

Gang-combating efforts across the Bay have been scaled down in the midst of a flurry of shootings that killed 15 people and injured scores of others since May.

The police’s national intervention unit, from Gauteng and Mthatha, and an out-oftown tactical response team were withdrawn at the end of May while police top brass plan to find a permanent solution to combat the ongoing violence.

Part of the intervention plan was also to have the elite special task force, from Pretoria, sent to the Bay to assist when required.

The two units had been deployed to Gelvandale and Bethelsdorp since February as a back-up protocol to the existing manpower sent to the area.

The deployment was part of police minister Bheki Cele’s visit to the Bay, where he promised to intervene and clamp down on gangsterism.

Cele also promised the

An anti-gang unit is earmarked to be rolled out in Bay in near future

establishment of an anti-gang unit, similar to that launched in Cape Town in November 2018. The unit is earmarked to be rolled out in the Bay in the near future.

Officials, however, called for calm, stating that even though two units had withdrawn from the Bay, the tactical response teams, crime combating unit, visible gang intervention team and public order policing unit, as well as the K9 and flying units, remained in the gangridden areas.

These units have been operating in problematic areas since December, while the national intervention unit was brought in to assist them in February.

Police said the national intervention unit was tasked to stay in the Bay only for three months before the operational plan would be revised.

Police spokesperson Colonel Priscilla Naidu said the national intervention unit was part of a temporary structure.

“We have supplemented the intervention team with existing local manpower. “We are in the process of restructuring the environment, and we have assets and a strategy to address the gang-related problem in the northern areas,” Naidu said.

“The plan will be unfolded once the strategy is approved.”

Naidu was referring to the soon-to-be-announced antigang unit rolling out in the Eastern Cape.

“One should not look entirely at the assets at the disposal of the police.

“Addressing the scourge of violence in these areas is a collective effort which includes the communities as well as other government and nongovernment organisations . . . ”

This comes after six Cape Town anti-gang unit officers were shot and wounded while tracking down wanted gang members linked to a series of shootings in the Samora Machel area.

Earlier in June, Cele said the 72-hour action plan would deploy about 200 officers to lock down Samora Machel and locate the culprits.

The downscaling in the Bay came only days after police arrested Khoisan chief Crawford Fraser, Hakeem Vencencie and Gabriel Machune after they participated in a demonstration against gangsterism.

The three were allegedly part of the group which embarked on a show-of-force motorcade in the northern areas.

Naidu could not say when the anti-gang unit would be launched in the Bay and declined to provide operational details about the unit’s deployments.