Cape Town - It is clear that Police Minister Bheki Cele has no intention of withdrawing the appeal against the Western Cape Equality Court order that national government is discriminating against poor and black Western Cape residents in how it allocates police resources, the Democratic Alliance said on Sunday.
Cele "should hang his head in shame". He had still not withdrawn the South African Police Service's (SAPS) appeal against the Western Cape Equality Court order, Western Cape community safety MEC and DA premier candidate Alan Winde said in a statement.
"It’s been more than a month (25 January 2019) since minister Cele announced during a radio interview on Cape Talk that the appeal has been withdrawn," he said.
In December, the court found that the system the national police use to allocate resources was unfairly discriminating against poor and black people in the Western Cape. The remedy had been postponed to a later date.
“The behaviour of minister Cele is an absolute disgrace. Quite frankly, it clearly demonstrates that he has no intention of withdrawing this appeal. He and his ANC-led national government have always discriminated against the most vulnerable in our society, and this will continue where they govern.
"This also shows that they do not care about the continued fear that people are living in. They do not care that innocent children are dying at the hands of criminals," Winde said.
Cele’s only purpose was to "host talkshops and imbizos where he makes empty promises with absolutely no action".
Cele should stop discriminating against people and address the resourcing problem. The Western Cape continued to have a shortage of 4500 police officers, and Cele was mandated to "ensure that we receive our resources".
"Upon rejecting our recent call for the deployment of the army as a peace-keeping force, he claimed that the current interventions are 'yielding success'. Reports of 25 murders in Mitchells Plain for February alone and 18 murders in Bonteheuwel since the beginning of the year paint a completely different reality.
"I will continue to fight for our fair share of resources, as well as the decentralisation of the police, as the scourge of crime in our province cannot continue in this way. The manner in which this province is being prejudiced by national government must come to an end,” Winde said.