Masemola bolsters police force to fight gangs, extortionists

The National Commissioner of police, General Fannie Masemola, has deployed extra capacity to the Eastern Cape province to clampdown on extortionists and gangs, the South African Police Service (SAPS) announced on Tuesday.

Masemola said communities cannot be held at ransom by extortionists and encouraged the public to report cases of extortion to law enforcement officers.

“The challenge that we are having is that community members are reluctant to report incidents of extortion. We urge our communities to, when called upon, come forward and report all forms of criminality to us and who these people are, to enable us to effect more arrests and ensure we build water tight cases that will be able to stand in court.

“For us to pin down these extortionists, we need witnesses. We urge the communities cooperation in this regard. We have dedicated teams that are assigned to these cases. We are also looking at increasing capacity to register more cases and ensure takedowns”, said the General.

The multidisciplinary teams have been deployed to prevent, combat, investigate, and arrest those behind incidents of gang violence and extortion, among other things.

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According to SAPS, the deployment of additional boots on the ground comes off the back of a visit and community stakeholder engagements in Mthatha and Gqerberha led by the government officials as well as SAPS Management.

Three senior officers consisting of the head of organised crime, specialised operations and intelligence from SAPS National Headquarters have been deployed to the Eastern Cape province, each with dedicated teams under their command, SAPS revealed.

While SAPS stated that it is making inroads in dealing “decisively with gangs” demanding extortion fees from businesses, it also conceded that more needs to be done to contain the problem.

In addition, other “problematic provinces” have been identified by SAPS where most of these extortion cases often take place.

“In the Western Cape, well-known construction Mafia gang leader, Ralph Stanfield, his wife and fourteen others are facing 32 charges relating to the Prevention of Organised Crime act, this in relation to extortion fees.”

Earlier this month, Public Works and Infrastructure Minister Dean Macpherson said he welcomed the joint effort by the private and public sectors in Cape Town to address the growing occurrence of the construction mafia at developmental projects, and looked forward to similar actions being replicated nationwide.

“To eradicate the rise of lawlessness at construction sites across the country, it will require that we all work together, and make use of new and innovatory approaches to fight crime,” he said.