Guns out for criminals this festive season: SAPS

30 November 2016 - 16:26 By Neo Goba

The South African Police Service has declared war on criminals and those who break the law this festive season. Speaking at the launch of the Festive Season Operations in Gauteng on Wednesday at the Mall of Africa‚ Gauteng Commissioner Lieutenant-General Deliwe de Lange said more police officers have and will be deployed in hotspots where crime is inflated."We are going to deploy as many members as we can as we received extra resources from the head office. We will cover all the areas in Gauteng starting with the malls and we have already identified problematic malls as far as certain crimes are concerned‚" said De Lange.Malls and suburbs are the most targeted areas by criminals during the festive season."We are definitely going to be visible in those malls as we started last week Friday. All members who used to do administrative work‚ will go out to supplement the resources that are already on the street‚" she added.Asked which areas and malls were hotspots‚ De Lange said she couldn't share that information as it would jeopardise the operations strategy as it would tamper with their intelligence work. She did however say they would give priority to those malls.De Lange said they are relying on the information of intelligence to catch criminals in the act.The provincial commissioner also added that 2‚000 police students‚ 13‚000 metro police officers as well as 32‚000 members of the SAPS will be deployed in problematic areas‚ including manning roadblocks...

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