Durban - The KwaZulu-Natal government has thrown its weight behind Operation Fiela, saying it had long wished for joint searches and raids now conducted by the police, army and home affairs officials.
“To us Operation Fiela is a model that should be encouraged, because we are of the view that it is important for government to lead the programme of a united front against crime,” Community Safety and Liaison MEC Willies Mchunu said on Wednesday.
Mchunu was speaking at a presentation by provincial police commissioner, Lieutenant-General Mmamonye Ngobeni, on the province’s police successes recorded between March and this month.
This happened hours before a court in Gauteng dismissed an application by the Lawyers for Human Rights challenging aspects of the operation as unlawful.
Mchunu, however, said Operation Fiela should not be an everyday occurrence.
“We think it must be targeted. If used correctly in targeted areas, it will deal with criminality,” he said.
A presentation by Ngobeni showed that of the 45 747 arrests between March and June, 2 506 were undocumented persons.
The nationalities of those arrested and the nature of their crimes was not specified.
“To us it is not about being a national and immigrant, but, it’s about being a criminal,” Ngobeni said.
Premier Senzo Mchunu said efforts to fight crime should be commended. “Whether those crimes are committed by pastors or not, crime is crime,” he said.
The premier said the police would waste time if they concerned themselves with identities of people when they effected arrests. “The issue is that you are not arresting foreigners, you arrest offenders,” he said.
Earlier, Ngobeni beamed slides of the crime statistics and hailed the successes achieved by the multi-disciplinary approach.
Her approximately 40-page report was not released to the media, other than allowing journalists to take down notes and photograph the slides with their cellphones.
Ngobeni could not say if crime had gone up or down for the same period compared with last year. However, she highlighted murder, house robbery and business robbery. But car hijackings remained a concern, especially in Durban.
“We have established a task team to deal with car hijackings around eThekwini – Pinetown, Umlazi and Durban. There are challenges, as we are of view this crime as organised,” Ngobeni added.
In her report she said 778 arrests were made in connection with business robbery, house robberies and car hijackings, while 211 were made on theft of vehicles.
Daily News