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- A Stuijt
- Retired South African medical journalist, ex-Sunday Times of Johannesburg.
South Africa is sliding into anarchy
21:54 | 
Posted by
A Stuijt |
One child raped every 3 minutes, 3 children murdered each day…
“This is intolerable: one child is raped every three minutes; three children are murdered each day; our murder rate is 11 times than the US’, and South Africa’s abuse of cocaine and marihuana has risen by 20 percent within the past two years; 1,100 Thai women have been lured into the country to work as sex-slaves during the WC2010 football tournaments; and criminals are always one step ahead of the authorities…”
Yoga class women robbed, tied up
Camps Bay Cape Town. August 3 2009. An entire yoga class with seven women was attacked by a couple of masked men brandishing guns in upperclass Camps Bay’s community hall in Little Glen. The news was revealed only two weeks after the event on the members-0nly Camps Bay Community Security initiative website by the instructor Judy Farrah. The women and their instructor were robbed of wallets, jewellery and cellphones.
Picture: South African civilians spend most of their waking hours now either worrying about crime, reporting on crime, preventing crime, paying for high-security fencing and electronic gadgets. and defending themselves from, or chasing down criminals – while of course still also having to pay their taxes for a police force which is now steadily imploding. One Camps Bay resident recently chased this daylight robber he’d photographed looting a car of about R40,000’s worth of goods… He was bold as brass and wore the latest designer clothes, the resident reported. He chased but didn’t catch him.
Judy Farrah, who was instructing the yoga class at the community hall in Camps Bay two weeks ago, said she was grateful that no one was hurt during the robbery. After they were robbed, the women were tied up in the storeroom of the hall. While tied up, one of the women pressed a panic button -- but instead of coming to their aid, an armed response team went to a nearby building. Police spokesman Ian Rudman said no one had yet been arrested for the crime "due to the lack of descriptions". Perhaps: but they did have something even better, namely their DNA because the clothes from the robbers, along with their balaclavas were found discarded near the scene.
- Bernard Schafer, of the security initiative, blamed the weeds instead of the criminals: "the problem with Little Glen is that it is overgrown and allows temporary vagrants to shelter there. The place needs cleaning up of its alien vegetation which prevents law enforcement from properly policing the area," said Schafer
- Vagrants wearing designer clothes like the daylight robber in this picture, perhaps?
- This article was originally published on page 6 of Cape Times on August 03, 2009
- http://campsbayratepayers.blogspot.com/2006/04/camps-bay-ratepayers-and-residents.html
- http://www.campsbaywatch.org/en/section/events
‘South Africa is sliding into anarchy…’
That is the opinion recently voiced by Dr Lionel Mtshali, leader of the Official Opposition, (tel. 078 302 0929 http://www.ifp.org.za/ ) pictured in the middle with UNICEF’s Carol Bellamy and SA Pres. Jacob Zuma. Mtshali made the comment in Durban.
July 24 2009 – DURBAN. “It is an increasingly intolerable fact of life in this province and country that hardly a day passes without us hearing of yet anothermurder, rape, abduction or burglary. “
According to a recent study conducted by the Solidarity Union, with which the Inkatha Freedom Party has had a long and fruitful association, one child is raped every three minutes in South Africa, and every day, three children are murdered. murder rate is 11 times higher than in the United States, which has one of the highest crime rates in the developed world. The recently released United Nations 2009 World Drug Report paints an equally grim picture. Drug abuse in South Africa, according to the report, is currently twice the world norm. The Central Drugs Authority, which is a government drug control organisation, concurs by reporting that the abuse of cocaine and marihuana has increased by 20 percent in two years.
To illustrate these statistics, I will mention the recent drug busts involving South African Airways crews and even the well-publicised drug bust linked to the wife of a very high-ranking politician known to some members of this House.
The drug abuse problem in South Africa remains very serious while our authorities do not always inspire confidence in
dealing with it adequately. Unfortunately, our crime problem is only to get worse as the 2010 soccer World Cup approaches.
Those 450,000 WC2010 football fans will be soft targets for our criminals…
As much as we are looking forward to this international sporting event and the economic opportunities it will provide to our citizens to put South Africa on the global map, the fact remains that the Soccer World Cup will present our police with additional challenges.
“Tourists tend to attract crime, and the 450,000 of them whom we expect to attend the tournament will be a soft target for criminals. Our party’s recommendation to the Hon. MEC for Community Safety and Liaison is
to analyse the successes and deficiencies of our existing crime-prevention measures during the recent Confederations Cup tournament.
The 1,000 foreign tourists who came for this tournament are effectively pioneers for the much larger number expected during the 2010 World Cup. Let us use them retrospectively as a focus group and learn from this recent experience.
Criminals are always one step ahead of the authorities…
One of the most obvious solutions to the challenge of minimising crime during the 2010 World Cup is visible policing. We must strive to take away from potential crimials the opportunity to commit the crimes. It is labour-intensive and resource-expensive to do this, but we have to try and establish a solid policing presence in all places identified as
crime hotspots.
- In some ways, criminals are already one step ahead of the authorities.
More Thai sex-slaves brought in, kept ‘underground’ for WC2010 tourists
Justice Department sources say they have information that with the 2010 soccer World Cup looming, more women are being brought in and kept "underground" in residential areas until closer to the time. The SAPS themselves have estimated that are currently between 800 and 1,100 Thai women in South Africa who have been "trafficked" here for sexual exploitation - and a third of them have been lured here believing they are coming to work in honest jobs.
Similarly, most NGOs predict a significant increase in the number of children drawn to the streets ahead of the tournament, while several have expressed concern about a predicted militant round-up by the authorities.
Growing crime is fought with budget cuts?
These are very serious challenges the Department of Community Safety and Liaison has to get involved in, especially as it tightens its fiscal belt following the 7.5 percent reduction in MTEF allocations. The budget cut should, however, not be used by the department as an excuse for the lack of service delivery. Even when its budget increased in the past,
this did not necessarily translate into effective crime-combating measures.
One last word about the Hawks (the SA police’s new internal crime investigation agency). There was much vigorous debate - even in this House - that accompanied the demise of the Directorate of Special Operations, known as the Scorpions. A new unit, the Hawks, was promptly launched on the day the Scorpions ceased to exist, although its structures were far from finalised. Earlier this month, the SAPS conceded that it could take a year before the Hawks had a full staff complement. Despite lavish newspaper advertising singing odes to the Hawks, the new elite unit remained for a long time after its establishment hardly more than a one man show with Anwa Dramat being its
only member.
Why does it take so long to vet 218 former Scorpions for the Hawks police unit?
- We are told that members of the defunct Scorpions and the police who had applied to join the new organised-crime-fighting unit that are still awaiting finalisation of their clearance process. The police have failed to explain convincingly why vetting 218 former Scorpions, whose security clearance had been routinely updated at their old jobs, is taking so long.
These are only some of the questions the Official Opposition will keep asking in this House and outside of it to ensure that the Department of Community Safety and Liaison and the provincial government in general remain accountable to the members of the public who depend on their services for their safety and security. Contact: Dr Lionel Mtshali, 078 302 0929 Date: 24 July 2009
SA Police in a state of crisis --
- policing standards are dropping everywhere warns Democratic Alliance
“in almost every area of the SA Police Service, standards are slipping and efforts to combat crime are becoming increasingly ineffective, the DA says. "Currently the South African Police Service (Saps) is in a state of crisis," Democratic Alliance spokesperson Dianne Kohler-Barnard told a media briefing at Parliament.
At present, South Africans faced one of the highest crime rates in the world, and many felt trapped inside their homes and suspicious of those in their communities.
"We cannot build a united, prosperous nation while so many feel trapped in a web of terror caused by crime," she said.
30,000+ firearms stolen from police stations now in hands of criminals
The disastrous Saps record on losing firearms had to be tackled immediately. Since 2001, 14 117 weapons had been lost or stolen from police stations, increasing by 165% from 943 in 2001/02 to 2 507 in 2008/09.
Most of these were now on the streets in the hands of criminals. In addition to this, many thousands more weapons were lost by metro police and other local government law enforcement officials.
- It was likely that between 20 000 and 25 000 police and metro weapons had ALSO been lost or stolen since 2000.
Yet the Saps continued to focus on legal firearm owners, she warned.
The continuous increase in missing police case dockets also had to be resolved immediately.
The number of lost dockets had increased every year since 2003, and totalled over 2 500 in that time period.
At present, only 6% of these incidents resulted in disciplinary procedures.
All officers should be held to account for negligence, and a new system implemented that would see dockets regularly backed up electronically.
backlog of 20,000 cases at police forensic labs
The bottleneck in forensic science laboratories, where over 20 000 samples were currently backlogged, had a severe impact on conviction rates and needed to be resolved.
Also needing attention was the serious staffing anomalies in the police. The size of the police service should be increased to 250 000, and the detective pool by 30 000. htttp://www.news24.com/Content/SouthAfrica/News/1059/ce53777b609349998190945fa2899bea//SAPS_standards_keep_dropping
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Death of Cassandré van Rooyen solved
20080218 Controversial mystery of teen victim Cassandré van Rooyen (17), solved – two youths admit to culpible homicide in accidental shooting
Aug 3 2009 – Two youths, Ken Maree, now 18, and an unidentified 15-year-old youth, today appeared in the Johannesburg High Court, submitting confessions regarding the mystery death of 17-year-old Afrikaner teen Cassandré van Rooyen, whose lifeless body was found on a smallholding on 18 February 2008 with a bullet-wound in the back of her head.
At the time, the news media claimed that the girl had been found ‘naked’, however this turned out to be inaccurate information.
The Van Rooyen girl’s mystery death created deep divisions within the local Afrikaner community this entire past year because two Afrikaans youths were arrested and charged shortly afterwards for her ‘murder’, with the police also publicly persisting in referring to the arrested 17-year-old youth as ‘a man’ and angry family members, describing him as a ‘social misfit’, also demanding that he be charged in a public court of law as an adult instead of behind closed doors in a youth court.
However, it emerged today from the confessoin that then 17-year-old Ken Maree had been an accessory to covering up the girl’s accidental death, and that the 15-year-old has now admitted to her culpible homicide.
The dead Afrikaner teen lived with the Maree family on the smallholding during the week, and always spent weekends in Alberton with her mother, Maria. it was reported at the time of her death.
Ken Maree on Monday admitted in a statement submitted to the Johannesburg High Court statement to being an accessory to culpible homicide -- and the 15-year-old youth admitted in his statement to a charge of culpible homicide in the Johannesburg High Court on Monday.
Cassandré was a matric pupil and popular cheerleader at the Afrikaans Bekker High School in Magaliesburg, and was staying at the smallholding when she was shot under circumstances which still remain very murky.
Dressed in shorts and a top, the petite schoolgirl was found in an overgrown garden with a gaping gun-shot wound to the head.
Almost immediately after her death, Ken Maree, then 17, a former pupil at Van Rooyen’s school and a fifteen-year-old already were arrested and questioned by police in connection with her death and charged with murder, according to inspector Solomon Sibiya from the West Rand police, who very persistently referred to the Afrikaans 17-year-old as ‘a man”, was quoted at the time as saying:
- “We suspect that the girl was killed elsewhere and her body dumped there. Since her disappearance, our dog unit and the flying squad searched the area around the house and found nothing.” http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=711785
Why did the police inspector refer to a 17-year-old as ‘a man?”
It’s still not clear why the youths were being charged with murder instead of being accused of the lesser charges of culpible homicide a year ago: Sibiya also told the news media at the time that the 15-year- old had actually confessed to shooting Van Rooyen by accident, but the boy’s lawyer, Karl Schüler, said at that time that he was not willing to comment on this.
On Monday, the youths’ signed confessions describing the circumstances of the girl’s tragic death, finally seem to be bringing this controversial case to an end.
Thus far all the proceedings were held in camera. Sean Haskins, a friend of Van Rooyen’s stepfather, Boet Jordaan, said: “We want justice. Cassandre was such a beautiful girl.” He said it was upsetting for Jordaan and for him ‘to sit through the proceedings and look at the teenagers accused of killing the popular matric girl.”
Since that time, two diametrically opposed support groups have also grown up around the case on the internet, with her stepfather Boet van Rooyen -- right on this picture by the Sunday Times of Johannesburg’s photographer Alon Skuy -- demanding that justice must be seen to be done – in public.
Investigating officer Captain Poen Muller also was quoted as saying just after her death that the Maree family, with whom she had been staying had reported her missing, at the Krugersdorp police station that Tuesday morning. Carl Maree said his family last saw Cassandre on Monday evening, doing her homework.
The entire story will be published in Beeld newspaper tomorrow by their investigative journalist Magdel Fourie.
XDR-TB and AIDS-treatment must be integrated - SA deputy president
by Adriana Stuijt a.j.stuijt@knid.nl
South Africa’s deputy president has announced an important policy change for treating the country’s devastating co-epidemics of TB and AIDS. Ever since it was first identified in 2005, a drug-resistant strain, XDR-TB coinfections with AIDS, has begun killing South Africans at an alarming rate, often within 15 days of diagnosis. Now each month, 50,000 new cases are diagnosed as carrying these co-infections, and at least 1,000 people a month die from it. By 2008, a full 60 percent of all the AIDS-patients were diagnosed with TB co-infections. Kgalema Motlanthe has now warned on August 2 2009 that the country urgently needs integrated treatment facilities to fight these coinfections more effectively. At the moment, only one clinic by Medicins Sans Frontiers in Khayelitsha near Cape Town treats co-infected TB- and AIDS patients at one site, and with integrated drugs regimen. In the rest of the country, tens of thousands of co-infected patients still must visit two seperate facilities for their treatment and monitoring…
Services for HIV, TB Must Be Integrated - Motlanthe
By Chris Bathembu
Johannesburg - There is a need for greater integration of the Tuberculosis (TB) and HIV services in South Africa, given the high co-infection rate of the two diseases, Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe said on Friday.
Speaking to reporters following a meeting of the South African National Aids Council (SANAC), Mr Motlanthe said measures including increasing the number of HIV positive patients tested for TB and strengthening infection control would have to be applied to make the plan work.
"It has been proposed that TB becomes part of the agenda for SANAC so that further progress can be made in addressing TB/HIV co-infection in particular," he said. The meeting, which was called to assess government's progress in addressing South Africa's AIDS pandemic, was the first Mr Motlanthe attended in his capacity as Chairperson of SANAC.
Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi and other role-players in the health sector also attended the meeting. The Deputy President said a World Health Organisation's (WHO) review of the national TB control programme had found that there was a significant improvement – after its representatives had visited government facilities and districts in all nine provinces.
- "Cure rates have improved and defaulter rates are declining," said Mr Motlanthe. He further said over 90 percent of TB patients in South Africa were being tested for HIV.
However, said Mr Motlanthe, the WHO review also identified the gaps in the treatment of drug-resistant TB and shortages of resources in the TB programme. "SANAC welcomed the review report and agreed that TB should be part of SANAC's agenda and the work of SANAC's structures," he said.
Minister Motsoaledi said his department will be on high alert for a possibility of provinces running out of funds before the end of the financial year for the TB control programme, as it happened in the Free State province recently. "Its something we will definitely be looking at," he said. In a bid to minimize infections during the 2010 FIFA World Cup next year, the sport and entertainment sector of SANAC will convene a summit in September to consider how the tournament can be used to ensure a focus on preventative measures. –BuaNews http://allafrica.com/stories/200908030929.html?viewall=1
Healthcare workers at significant risk of XDR-TB infection:
Warnings were also issued on May 29 2009 that healthcare workers in South Africa are at a significantly increased risk of developing drug-resistant tuberculosis, XDR-TB – and moreover, the rapid progression of this nearly uncurable, deadly lung-disease also threatens to destabilize global TB-control in its rapid march throughout the sub-Saharan region of Africa.
This warning was issued by top researchers from Calgary, Boston and Cape Town’s medical universities, while presenting a series of reports on their latest findings at the prestigious 105th American Thoracic Society International Conference in San Diego on May 17.
The researchers warned after presenting their detailed studies of the exact way in which health-care workers became infected with XDR-TB in South Africa, that ‘infection control was urgently needed to prevent the spread of extremely-drug-resistant tuberculosis among healthcare workers worldwide’. see
Black Americans also at greater risk of acute respiratory diseases like TB:
- And in another important study, researchers from the Emory University school at Atlanta also issued a warning that black Americans were at 50% higher risks of acute respiratory diseases such as Tuberculosis than were white Americans. This important finding, which points to genetic predisposition in addition to poor living environments, closely matches similar study results in South Africa, where the black population historically showed proportionally higher rates of acute respiratory diseases than do whites, even when comparisons were made between white and black destitute families in the identical living poor conditions. Dr Sarah Erickson of Emory university said in her presentation that more research funding must be made available to investigate why black Americans are more prone to acute respiratory diseases than are whites. For the abstract of the American study see Most of the XDR-TB cases identified in the USA still are among foreign-born migrants into the country. For the prevalence of drug-resistant TB in the United States, see
Dramatic march of XDR-TB worldwide:
But it’s the dramatic progress of XDR-TB which worries the international health-care community so much, mainly because there’s almost no effective cure for this strain at all. TB had been beaten back for years, but now is making a new come-back worldwide. And the only way to stop its progress at the moment, is to prevent it from spreading more: there’s no effective vaccine against it, either.
“The progression of XDR-TB is threatening to destabilize global tuberculosis control,’ warned Cape-Town based researcher Dr Keertan Dheda, associate professor of medicine at the University of Cape Town. He was speaking at the ATS International Conference, which is devoted to the presentation and discussion of new research findings and the latest clinical developments in respiratory, critical care and sleep medicine.
- During the conference, more than 13,500 attendees heard over 5,300 original research presentations related to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of respiratory diseases such as lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma, allergies, sleep-related disorders, cystic fibrosis, tuberculosis and many more. Click here for other reports
Swine flu kills far fewer people than does XDR-TB
The research documents submitted about the rapidly-spreading XDR-TB epidemic in South Africa drew a large number of delegates and a high level of interest from the news media too - although not as high as the sessions on the Swine Flu epidemic, which thus far has infected about 11,034 people and killed 9 people worldwide thus far this year.
Hundreds of thousands of deaths from XDR-TB in southern Africa
- The XDR-TB epidemic in South Africa has already killed many hundreds of thousands of patients since it was first detected in KwaZulu-Natal province in 2006 – and is still spreading like wildfire throughout the continent south of the Sahara. It’s difficult to diagnose, but patients with poor immune systems usually die from it within just weeks of admission to hospitals.
The researchers warned that their latest studies ‘underscored the urgent need for stringent TB screening policies among healthcare workers in these areas.” 
Dheda and collaborators Julie Jarand, MD jmjarand@ucalgary.ca tel 403 943 5425 from the University of Calgary and Max O’Donnell, MD from Boston University said their retrospective studies focused on healthcare workers who have contracted XDR-TB in a non-outbreak setting.
- Dr. Dheda said that “the purpose of this study was to describe a series of healthcare workers in South Africa with extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis and to determine whether XDR-TB was prevalent among them,” Dr. Dheda noted.
Dr Dheda’s study was based on a chart review of 317 patients in South Africa with passively detected XDR-TB, including 11 healthcare workers. Of those 11, eight were working in district hospitals, 10 had been treated for TB at least once previously and eight were negative for HIV. At the time these workers were diagnosed with XDR-TB, there were no standard infection control measures in place at the facilities where they were employed.
- Drs. O’Donnell and Dheda also presented their findings from similar studies at Kwa-Zulu Natal and four treatment centers in South Africa, respectively.
Young, mostly female, non-smoking, non-HIV health care workers:
Among 317 'passively detected' XDR-TB cases in South Africa, eleven health care workers were identified who contracted it in a 'non-outbreak' setting. The patients were young, average age 36 years, predominantly female (91%), non-smokers (100%), mostly nurses working in district hospitals. Eight of these eleven patients also were HIV-negative.
Ten of these patients had been treated for TB on at least one previous occasion.
XDR-TB is important health risk globally for health workers…
It was concluded by this research that XDR-TB is 'an important risk for health care workers globally, particularly for those who work and/or travel to high burden areas, regardless of HIV-status'. The researchers said that 'urgent infection control and rapid diagnostic testing for all health care workers suspected of TB needs to be undertaken to minimize the risk of drug-resistant TB'.
Dr. Dheda noted that although tuberculosis is a ‘well-recognized occupational risk’ for healthcare workers in both low- and high-income countries, the prevalence and natural history of XDR-TB in these particular workers was unknown.
Health workers’ shortage at crisis levels in Sub-Saharan Africa:
“The emergence and progression of XDR-TB is threatening to destabilize global tuberculosis control,” he said. “The negative impact of XDR-TB is further exacerbated by (… ) a shortage of health workers which has reached crisis levels in most of sub-Saharan Africa.”
“XDR-TB is an important risk for healthcare workers globally, particularly for those who work or travel to high-burden areas, regardless of HIV status,” Dr. Dheda added. “Implementation of infection control measures and rapid diagnostic testing for all healthcare workers suspected of TB needs to be undertaken urgently to minimize the risk of drug-resistant TB.”
However it must also be noted that in South Africa, many of the health-care staffing shortages are due to the fact that the South African government has banned and even fired the vast majority of white health care staff, and often are unable to replace them with trained black workers, thus leaving many thousands of health care sector jobs open. They have even been forced to take on ‘suitably-coloured’ doctors from Cuba and Morocco to fill these vacancies.
Six percent of new TB cases in Cape Town are drug-resistant
At least 6% of people diagnosed with tuberculosis in Khayelitsha township near Cape Town, South Africa last year alredy had a drug-resistant strain of the disease. This was reported by Medicines Sans Frontieres in a report on its pilot programme in the township. http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/269719
other sources and links:
Medicines Sans Frontieres Khayelitsha treatment regimen document:
- http://ajol.info/index.php/samj/article/view/43701/27226
- http://www.thoracic.org/sections/publications/press-releases/conference/articles/2009/abstracts-and-press-releases/jarand.pdf
- http://www.thoracic.org/sections/publications/press-releases/conference/articles/2009/abstracts-and-press-releases/erickson.pdf
- http://www.cdc.gov/tb/xdrtb/
- http://www.cdc.gov/tb/CE/mdrandxdrtb/SlideText.htm
- http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/
- Drug-resistant tuberculosis is a 'time bomb' warns WHO
- Resistente TB/AIDS in ZA lijkt nu nog ver weg, maar het is een kleine wereld tegenwoordig
Young whites emigrate, young blacks die of XDR-TB/AIDS in South Africa:
Doctors strike at South African public hospitals:
Racist hiring quotas cripple South African hospitals:
6 % of TB cases are drug-resistant in Cape Town: (2008)
Images by Adriana Stuijt
Policing standards ‘keep dropping”
Commanding officer moves into his police station
Aug 3 2009 - Gloria Edwards of Beeld newspaper reports from Heidelberg, East Rand that the commanding officer of the local police station has moved lock, stock and barrel into his office. Senior Superintendent David Matlahola has been living in his office at Ratanda police station near Heidelberg since the police stopped paying him (with taxpayers' money) approximately R8 000 per month to stay in a guest house. Beeld was told that staff at the police station have no option but to stand by and watch as Matlahola washes himself in the kitchen every morning.
Apparently he's also held meetings in his pyjamas, and has sent officers out to buy his lunch when they should be working.
Matlahola has been on sick leave for the past two weeks, while still staying in his office, said Johan Bester, chair of the Heidelberg Community Policing Forum (CPF) telephone 028 722 1910/1441 .
"Staff couldn't get to the photocopiers and fax machines to send or receive important documents."
When Beeld visited Matlahola's office, boxes with his personal belongings, home furniture, mattresses and a bedroom suite, among other things, were lodged in his office. Matlahola admitted that he's been living in his office.
According to Bester, Matlahola, the former commanding officer at the Heidelberg police station, was suspended in 2002 after a charge of sexual harassment was investigated against him. "Apparently he was transferred to Limpopo province, before being transferred back to Ratanda."
A source at Heidelberg police station told Beeld that Matlahola appealed against the suspension and won the case, upon which he was offered the post in Ratanda. Bester said the police have been paying for Matlahola’s lodging in a local guesthouse for about three months at R8,000 per month, while he was supposed to be looking for permanent accommodation.
- "Matlahola insisted that he be provided with a government house, but as senior superintendent he doesn't qualify for this benefit. About two weeks ago, he had all his possessions stored in his office and other police buildings, and is now living there."
His broken-down private vehicle is parked outside the police station. A police official said Matlahola often sends officers to buy food for him. "The size of Ratanda, and its crime levels don't even justify the presence of a senior superintendent. We've always just had a superintendent as commanding officer," said this unnamed policeman, who was not identified for fear of victimisation. The last-available SAPS crime stats for Heidelberg in Gauteng province date back to the end of 2007, view them:
The complaints of several outraged taxpayers and police officials from Ratanda have fallen on deaf ears, and they are now seeking help from the Heidelberg CPF, said Bester. Matlahola didn't want to comment any further, and referred all queries to provincial police spokesman superintendent Eugene Opperman. Opperman, however, was not aware of the situation. "We thank Beeld for bringing the matter to our attention. The situation will be dealt with internally," was all he would say. http://www.news24.com/Content/SouthAfrica/News/1059/a8d1544f675248f5a73a1395affd481c/03-08-2009%2008-08/Cop_moves_into_police_station
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