Pretoria - Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi is adamant in his quest to tackle crime in the province as he is currently in Europe studying hi-tech street lights with CCTVs, drone docking station and loudspeakers for emergency evacuation among other features.
Lesufi posted a video on Twitter where he was being shown a 5G street light pole with various features and the functions.
He said other features included, e-panic button and electric car charging station.
“The future is here, touch it,” Lesufi said.
One of the Twitter users asked the premier whether he was selling dreams.
“Turning a pie in the sky to be humble pie. I am studying future crime-stopping gadgets and devices,’’ replied Lesufi.
IOL reached out to Lesufi’s spokesperson, Vuyo Mhaga, to get more information on the new project and which country was hosting the premier, but Mhaga declined to say much and only confirmed the premier was currently in Europe.
Features of the new 5G street light pole pic.twitter.com/Z3RRrralpa
— Panyaza Lesufi (@Lesufi) March 21, 2023
During the State of the Province Address in February, Lesufi said Gauteng was home to “heartless and merciless criminals” and more needed to be done to fight crime.
He said they would increase the budget for fighting crime from R750 million to billions in the next three years.
“Starting from April 1, we will start to connect suburbs, townships, business districts, schools and other public places with hi-tech face and car recognition CCTVs. We will arm our residents with e-Panic buttons that will be linked to our law-enforcement agencies, CCTVs and our new state-of-the-art Integrated Command Centre,’’ said Lesufi at the time.
IOL