Cops wade into gangland wars

National police commissioner General Riah Phiyega has announced a raft of measures to stem the gang violence in which five children were wounded in 24 hours.

Three of the five were injured critically.

According to Phiyega, speaking in Port Elizabeth on gang violence, heavily armed officers will be deployed to saturate, infiltrate and eradicate ganglands.

Phiyega said the deployment of the National Intervention Unit, Tactical Response Team and Public Order Policing units would begin this week, with heavily armed police descending on areas around the country that are rife with gangsterism.

On Saturday, five children were injured in two shootings.

The youngest, three-year-old Luke Tibbetts, is being kept alive by life-support machines in a Johannesburg hospital.

In Cape Town, 15-year-old Cassiem Wilkinson is clinging to life, his spine severed and some organs ruptured. His friend, Tauriq Titus, 8, has a bullet lodged in his skull, centimetres from his brain. Chadwick Manuel, 16, and Berenice Adams, 14, shot in the hand and buttocks respectively, are out of immediate danger.

Their crime? Playing soccer in Parkwood, Cape Town, when the Junky Funky Kids and Americans gangs took aim at one another.

Later that day in Johannesburg, toddler Luke Tibbetts was sitting on his mother's lap as a friend gave them a lift home to Westbury when a suspected gangster opened fire on a motorist driving past them.

And criminologists and gang warfare experts expect the bloodshed to continue, with gangs having turned areas in Western Cape, Gauteng, Eastern Cape and Free State into "war zones".

But Fort Hare University crime anthropologist Theodore Petrus said a heavy-handed approach by the police had the potential for further bloodshed and the death of more children.

Luke's uncle Llewelyn Valentine appealed for protection.

"We need help, anything to stop this violence, the killings, attacks . We need the police before the gangs strike again," he said.

"We don't know why this happened. Why did they do this to our little boy? All we want is for this violence to stop. For our children to be safe."

Thapelo Moiloa, spokesman for Gauteng community safety MEC, Sizakele Nkosi-Malobane, said gangsterism was "mushrooming" across the province.

"We are trying to be proactive, running programmes targeting children, but we cannot say enough is being done.

"The police are trying their best, but the frustrations are immense. Communities know these gangsters but are scared to come forward."

He said multiple gangs operated in many suburbs.

"Everywhere they are targeting our children . . Gangsterism is rife in the schools, on the playgrounds and in the streets.

"It is getting out of hand, with the threat from vigilante groups, trying to protect themselves, becoming a serious problem. A lot more needs to be done by all government departments and quickly," Moiloa said.

Petrus said it was war.

"Gangsterism is out of control... government has no control.

"These gangs are not the street thugs of the past. They have morphed into highly sophisticated, fluid, adaptable and organised institutions.

"Their weapon is fear. They are the providers of services to the communities they live in, filling the vacuums left by state institutions, spreading their influence across the country."

He said the so-called spikes of violence were, in fact, the daily norm.

"It's a continuous war, where the collateral damage is our children who are caught in the crossfire.

"The expansion of territories is leading to turf wars spreading across the country.

"The government doesn't have a grip. Its heavy-handed counter-insurgency approach is problematic, creating the very real possibility of a tremendous increase in violence literally turning communities into war zones."

Ewald Botha, spokesman for Western Cape community safety MEC Dan Plato, said gang violence was increasing and was interlinked with drug crimes and battles over territories. "We need the reintroduction of specialised units . we need a holistic approach to address this scourge," he said.

Police spokesman Lieutenant-General Solomon Makgale said gangsterism manifested in different ways in different places, requiring location-specific tactics.