Public safety MMC David Tembe says he has new and exciting plans to ensure law and order reign in Johannesburg.
Tembe held a press briefing at the headquarters of the Joburg metro police yesterday where he announced the return of Operation Buya Mthetho, an initiative which seeks to enforce by-laws through strategic operations across the city of Johannesburg.
"It drives efforts on visible patrols, daily roadside checkpoints, major roadblocks and multiple joint operations with other law enforcement agencies or departments, community organisations," Tembe said.
According to Tembe, who has a good track record as a law enforcement official, the city's invigorated plans to get rid of crime included the deployment of 1 800 officers in the inner city in February and the equipping metro police officers to ensure that they are able to carry out their duties.
Tembe said one of his concerns was the increased number of road fatalities and killings which have taken place all over the city.
"We are going to reduce fatalities on our roads, by deploying our resources at the hotspots and lastly, due to the fact that we recently had a lot of drive-by-shootings, we have introduced 22, 44, 88 points day and night, as our crime prevention strategy where we stop and search vehicles for compliance on the roads," he said.
Tembe said he planned on ensuring the city's metro police played a more preventative role rather than a responsive role and this would be achieved through visible policing.
"During load-shedding, all metro police officers were assigned to do point duties in the morning from 6am to 9am and in the evenings from 4pm to 6pm," he said.
Tembe said there were plans to train more law enforcement officials. He said he hoped to clean up the image of JMPD and create trust among residents and the police officers.
"We are responsible to the people that have elected us. And so, it is important that we are accountable and transparent," he said.
Tembe said there had been some achievements that the police in the city have made through intensified efforts to ensure compliance and fight illegal activities.
"January 2022 to June 2022, the department removed a total of 1 540 shacks, took down over 20 000 illegal posters, impounded 5 390 perishable goods, and impounded 1 600kg cables and impounded 53 rubble removal trucks, just to name a few," he said.
Some of the highlights included the arrests of eight suspects for possession of stolen copper worth R1 million in Jeppestown. Two suspects were also apprehended for human trafficking in the Johannesburg CBD. Joint operations saw 25 scrapyards being raided. In addition, liquor outlets were also raided, and second-hand goods impounded.