Drunk under-18s should be detained until their parents come and collect them.
That’s what Durban North Councillor Heinz de Boer would like to see after a police raid on pubs and clubs in Durban North and Umhlanga last weekend.
De Boer, who joined the raid, said he was disgusted to see a 13-year-old girl passed out in a pool of vomit in an alley and was determined to crack down on under-age drinking, as the annual matric “rage” and festive season approaches.
“We saw a lot of under-age kids hanging around, with many under-age girls walking the street and dressed in a very provocative manner,” said De Boer.
He said it appeared to be common practice for teens to be given R500 by their parents to go out for the night, where alcopops and shooters were popular choices of drink.
And having alerted the public last week to a shocking trend of young men in Durban being raped after a night out, Rape Wise Chief Executive Officer John Buswell said the “16 Shooters” game – when a teen turning 16 has to consume 16 shots of alcohol – was common practice.
“Sixteen tots of alcohol is a lot to drink and teens are inexperienced in this regard,” said Buswell.
He said two parents had contacted him with regard to their sons being drugged during nights out after reading the article in The Independent on Saturday last week. “Both of them had consumed shooters and could not walk,” he said.
SAPS spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Mdunge said that while the festive season campaign had not yet been officially launched by the National Commissioner for KwaZulu-Natal, the public could expect a lot of police activity to curb crime leading up to, and during, the festive season. - Independent on Saturday