Pretoria - For two days residents of Jeffsville informal settlement in Atteridgeville took the fight against crime into their own hands after suffering a high rate of crime.
They said they had become tired of crime, so they, together with the police, decided to fight against it and apprehended a suspect who was jailed.
This was fuelled by a recent house break-in, where a suspect was recognised, said community leader Samuel Masilela, who added they started the initiative a while back as the community had experienced many cases of gender-based violence.
“We had someone who used to break into shacks owned by women who either lived alone or were two in the household.
“That person would break in, rob them at gunpoint and even rape them.
“This other time he even went to the length of taking one of the two women he robbed that night to a nearby sports ground in this informal settlement and raped her.”
Masilela said that was when the community realised they were no longer safe. The sports ground was not maintained by the municipality and was abandoned. “It has long grass, and nyaope boys live there. It is total chaos.
“When it is night time, you cannot pass there. We have pleaded with the municipality to fix it but it was never fixed.”
Masilela said as a community they then decided to take matters into their own hands. “We started to have meetings according to our blocks, to see if we all knew one another and to investigate those that we did not know.
“This was to help us know what was going on in our communities.”
Masilela said whistles were then bought, to be used to alert the community in case of an emergency.
“If there were things that were missing or taken during a break-in and we find someone in possession of those items, we question them until we find answers.”
Masilela said the community had tried to involve the police but it was not that effective.
“Recently we had many incidents of break-ins where a plasma television and other valuables were taken. In one of the incidents, two women recognised the perpetrator and blew a whistle to alert the community.
“We then gathered, apprehended the suspect and called the police. We later found that the police had let him go. We are not even sure that he even made it to the police station; we then went to his place. Many stolen things were in his possession.”
Masilela said besides the setback, they would continue to work together with the police in tackling crime in the community. “If we have a suspect we want to be escorted by the police to search their place.”
Masilela said it showed how united the community was towards fighting crime in its area.
Crime in the community had since decreased. “We have patrollers during the night, so crime has halved, especially the mugging and violence against women,” Masilela said.
Pretoria News