COMMUNITY policing forums (CPF) will escort emergency personnel into crime hot spots after 70 attacks on them over the past year.
Yesterday, close to 1 000 Emergency Medical Services (EMS) staff and residents gathered at the Brown’s Farm sports field as part of an anti-crime campaign. Emergency staff have been attacked in crime hot spots such as Philippi, Nyanga, Mitchells Plain, Khayelithsa and Atlantis.
Philippi CPF chairperson Khaya Dyantyi said street committees would play a vital role in assisting paramedics.
At least 70 cases of robbery, theft, damage to property, assault, death threats and hijacking of paramedics were reported in the past 12 months. Ten people have been arrested in connection with some of the cases.
Emergency personnel will now contact a police station, which in turn will contact a CPF to escort the ambulance to an emergency, wait for the team to finish, and take them out again. Yesterday’s march was part of Operation Khuseleka (Be Safe).
Provincial Health MEC Nomafrench Mbombo said: “We have done everything we could do as government. We have put money and resources in place. The business is unusual. We are angry. An attack on any public servant is an attack on me.
“We will never be quiet. We have done everything, but the attack on EMS continues.
“Ons is gatvol. What kind of a society attacks the people who help them? There is a time when we are going to down tools and not go to hot spot areas.
“Enough is enough. This is everyone’s business.”
Nyanga police station commander Vuyisile Ncata said: “We will escort you, although this affects my members and the community because it means when community members call for police assistance, they will be told a police van is not available because it is escorting an ambulance.”
With the police’s help, Dyantyi said, attacks will stop.
“Opportunistic criminals take advantage of the paramedics because they know they are alone and are unarmed and defenceless.”
Nyanga CPF chairperson Martin Makhasi said meetings were held with the police and health officials to discuss the paramedics’ safety concerns. “Now that we have taken the first step to protect the emergency personnel, rest assured they will not be targeted.”
Paramedic Nolubambo Kiwane, 26, said she was robbed of her cellphone and earrings early this year.
“Safety is our concern. We don’t have joy when we come to work because we don’t know what will happen while we are working,” she said.
Recently, two occupational therapists coming from Khululeka Educare Centre in Philippi were almost hijacked last month after witnessing a shooting outside the crèche.
Injongo and the Rotary Club of Claremont Project (IRCP) had just upgraded three Early Childhood Development (ECD) centres in Philippi worth R12 million in June to ensure they meet all the accreditation and registration requirements of the Department of Social Development (DSD). Khululeka was one of them.
IRCCP manager Phumeza Mahobe said the attempted hijacking had a detrimental effect on ECDs’ daily site inspection visits by specialists.
ER24 spokesperson Chitra Bodasing said: “We believe that the march would make a difference. By attacking and robbing EMS crews, for example, not only are their lives in danger, but also the lives of other innocent people who are in desperate need of medical attention.”
DSD spokesperson Sihle Ngobese said what was concerning was that the incident followed similar crime incidents which have in the past been directly aimed at government and NGO service providers in Philippi.
“This incident further points to the difficulty of rendering services in Philippi, where a spate of attacks on service providers such as EMS has made it difficult to access the most vulnerable and needy residents, in this case, the children at ECD centres.”