It is regrettable that police management only visited the scene of one of the most vicious killings three days after the fact.
Police minister Bheki Cele and Gauteng community safety MEC Faith Mazibuko on Saturday visited Zandspruit, in the west of Johannesburg, where a mob assaulted nine people and set them alight.
Nine men were beaten and burnt at the informal settlement on Wednesday, allegedly by a group of about 200 residents who accused them of carrying out robberies in the area. Five died on the scene while three others succumbed to their injuries in hospital, bringing the death toll to eight.
This was the most gruesome vigilante scene the country had experience in recent years. Nine young men were taken to a sports ground where they were severely beaten and necklaced.
We expected Cele and Mazibuko to be at that scene later that day to condemn the killings and listen to the community’s cries of poor service from the police. It turned out this was an issue the police's top brass deemed fit to attend to 72 hours later.
“They [residents] also reported to the police minister and the provincial police team that the Honeydew police station, which also serves the Zandspruit area, provides poor service to the community. They claim the local police are not only corrupt but at times ignore their policing needs.
"Some in the meeting believe the death of the youngsters, who were severely assaulted and burnt, could have been avoided if police responded on time,” Cele’s office said in a statement after the meeting.
Cele expressed concern about the allegations and promised that they would be “urgently investigated”. He also ordered that a task team be formed to look into the problems at Honeydew police station.
We welcome the steps the police minister has taken to deal with this matter, and the arrests of six people in connection with the attack of the nine victims. We will be watching and waiting for answers with the community as he promised to return with an update in less than a month.
We call on police management to prioritise addressing complaints of poor service delivery to avoid a repeat vigilantism. SA is not ready for the mayhem that jungle justice will unleash. We also urge residents to hand over crime suspects to the police to avoid landing up in jail themselves.
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