Cape Town – Pupils from four Belhar schools, backed by the community, will be marching to their local police station on Friday after the murder of three pupils this year.
This as a spate of robberies carried out on schoolchildren in Wynberg has prompted urgent talks on pupil safety. A Valhalla Park mother, Cynthia Stoulo, an ANC volunteer, also was shot dead yesterday while walking her 7-year-old child to school. She was shot several times in the face at 7.30am in an alleged hit.
"The reason why we are marching on Friday is because we want the violence to stop against women and school kids," Kalib Missoe, a community and youth activist based in Belhar, which has seen a spike in gang-related murders over the past few months, told the Cape Times.
"Last Friday a pupil at Excelsior High School was on his way to the shop when he was killed in gang crossfire. He was the third learner from Excelsior High School to be killed through gang violence in the past seven months.
"We will be marching to the Belhar SAPS and will hand over a memorandum with a list of demands, including for 24/7 visible policing.
"Police drive up and down in Belhar during the day, but at night you don't see any of them. But it's during the night that most of the shootings happen because gangs know the police are nowhere to be seen."
Former Excelsior High School Zachary van Wyk told Voice of the Cape Radio their demands include for police searches to be conducted at schools in the area; for murder investigations to be dealt with speedily, with better feedback to the families of the deceased; and for an overall “better relationship” between schools and the police.
Yesterday, Missoe said he was in the process of obtaining permission from the city council for the march. Consent forms for pupils from Excelsior High, Belhar Secondary School, Symphony High and Perseverance High will be signed by their respective principals and their parents.
A 100 pupils from each school and 10 members of the four schools' student representative council will be taking part in the march, Missoe said.
Missoe complained that the Belhar police as a whole were not serving the community, saying: "If the army were to be deployed in Belhar, it would make a big difference.
"I know for a fact that the Belhar SAPS are not really serving the community. There are some officials who are assisting the community, but there are some who aren't, who are working with the gangsters.
"I also don't even know if there is really a Community Policing Forum that serves the community because they are never engaging with the community, so you don't know what's going on."
Regarding Wynberg, Okuhle Hlati reported that a pupil at Douglas Road Primary School was robbed of a cellphone at knifepoint yesterday while walking along Shiplake Road.
A few hours later, another pupil was reportedly robbed at knifepoint opposite Wittebome High School.
The two incidents follow the mugging of pupils at Ottery Road Methodist Primary School, shortly after classes adjourned.
The provincial education department said Safe Schools would engage schools on the issue.