Cape Town - Police officers in the province have put their best arm forward as the Covid-19 vaccination programme kicked off at Milnerton police station.
Acting deputy provincial commissioner for support services, Nomthetheleli Mene, was the first to receive the vaccination. Mene said she was looking forward to being vaccinated.
She said they were looking at vaccinating all the officers in the province, which could be about 24 600 officers, 608 reservists, and at least 100 interns.
Mene said there would be 10 vaccination sites in the province, situated at different clusters. Apart from the Milnerton site, nine other sites would be opened on Monday to ensure that all members receive vaccinations.
SA Police and Allied Workers’ Union (Sapawu) president Bonga Makuliwe welcomed the vaccination of the officers and appealed to the management to ensure that all SAPS Act members and Public Service Act members were vaccinated and that it was done at a very fast pace, as they were most exposed to the Delta variant.
Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) provincial chairperson Conwe Flink, who was among the first to be vaccinated, said a lot of work had been done behind the scenes to release sufficient resources by the management and its stakeholders to ensure a smooth vaccination rollout process.
"We are happy that all SAPS employees, both SAPS Act, and Public Service members that are frontline workers, are prioritised with the vaccination program," said Flink.
He said with over 17 000 police officers in the province, they have experienced more than 6 000 infections, and many have lost their lives due to Covid-19.
"It has come to our attention from shop stewards on the ground that there are still some police stations not adhering to the agreed Covid-19 regulations, and we want to warn those not complying to not play with the lives of their members and must comply to regulations as agreed," said Flink.
SA Policing Union (Sapu) spokesperson Lesiba Thobakgale said the union was aware of the fact that there was much contradicting information circulating about the effectiveness and safety of the vaccine.
He said employees must ensure that they educate themselves with factual and correct information and not believe false and misleading information whose only purpose was to cause unnecessary panic and confusion.