Drunken driving, undocumented persons and reckless and negligent driving are some of the major offences that kept Johannesburg metro police officers on their toes between January and June.
These offences form part of the top three crimes which were revealed to have recorded the highest number of arrests made in the city.
Serious crimes such as car hijackings, robbery and murder also recorded significant numbers with the JMPD identifying Joburg CBD, Fourways, Lenasia, Alexandra, Roodepoort and Midrand as contributing a lot to these crimes. The city made 56 arrests for car hijackings and robberies .
The statistics were released yesterday by the MMC for public safety David Tembe and Joburg Metro Police Department (JMPD) acting chief Thulani Khanyile during a briefing where they were outlining the city's crime pattens for the first six months of the year. At least 3,291 people were arrested for various offences during this period and of this, 1,844 were nabbed for driving under the influence.
Khanyile said the hotspots for arrests for drunken driving include Joburg CBD (Yeoville, Hillbrow), Soweto, Lenasia and Fourways in the north of the city.
In the same period, 747 undocumented persons were arrested and 115 people nabbed for reckless and negligent driving. Tembe said the clampdown on acts of criminality is due to the city’s Operation Buya Mthetho.
About 83 land invasion operations were conducted and these included a series of deployments in the south of Johannesburg which has been identified as one of the hotspots.
Mathokoza Kgwaswane from the chief of police’s office also said regions A (Diepsloot, Ivory Park), G (Orange Farm, Lenasia,) and C (Roodepoort) were prone to land invasions.
“Any piece of open land in Joburg is targeted. We have appointed 11 private security companies to guard land properties after we evicted people who occupied them illegally,” he said. Kgwaswane said the companies were appointed on a three-year contract in October last year.
In May JMPD and SAPS officials conducted an operation to crack down on illegal land invasions at Zandspruit informal settlement. They demolished three brick and mortar structures built on a pavement which were unoccupied.
Scores of shacks were also demolished in Jackson informal settlement in Eikenhof, south of the city, in January after about 500 eviction notices were served to the residents who had illegally occupied the land.
The city removed 1,540 shacks in the first six months of the year, said Kgwaswane.
Meanwhile, it has emerged that access to reliable electricity remains a burning issue among residents as JMPD officers had to attend to 51 electricity-related protests.
In June Soweto residents blocked most major routes including the Old Potchefstroom Road between Klipspruit and Pimville, causing Rea Vaya bus services to be called off by the company as a precaution. The residents were demanding the reinstatement of electricity in certain areas.
In April, residents of Kliptown and Pimville near Walter Sisulu Square in Soweto protested, demanding that City Power restore electricity immediately after they had been without electricity for 13 days after a substation blew up in Eldorado Park on Good Friday.
In the same month, Kgomotso Diale was shot and killed, allegedly by Lesotho nationals at the Chicken Farm informal settlement after community members from Klipspruit and Pimvile went to Chicken Farm to ask about the recent theft of power cables that were causing constant blackouts to their homes. The incident raised tensions between the locals and foreign nationals in the area resulting in the intervention by police minister Bheki Cele.
''There is a huge expectation on the Johannesburg public safety and law enforcement fraternity. We have to keep everyone safe and we are not going to give up. Whatever it takes, we are going to fight criminals. We will start with these smaller things called bylaws. Those are irritants. Someone might think drinking in public is nothing. Those smaller things breed criminality. When I took office, I made sure we re-enforce Operation Buya Mthetho,’’ said Tembe.
Tembe said two JMPD officials and one member of the public were arrested for theft and illegally dealing in JMPD firearm ammunition while eight people were arrested for being in possession of stolen copper cables worth R1m.
Tembe said eight JMPD officers were fired for fraud and corruption and 13 cases were being investigated.
kokam@sowetan.co.za
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