Lesufi’s anti-crime wardens to start on May 1 but without a command centre

Provincial government negotiating with municipalities and other government entities to get their footage

28 April 2023 - 14:51
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Sello Maremane, centre, who headed the training of crime prevention wardens, with two of his officers during a media briefing in Midrand. On the left is Brandon Pietersen and on the right is Ntokozo Ngubane.
Sello Maremane, centre, who headed the training of crime prevention wardens, with two of his officers during a media briefing in Midrand. On the left is Brandon Pietersen and on the right is Ntokozo Ngubane.
Image: Penwell Dlamini

More than 4,000 crime prevention wardens are expected to hit the streets of Gauteng from May 1 as part of government’s plan to fight crime in the province. 

This was announced by Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi on Friday ahead of the graduation of the wardens on Sunday. The armed officers will be introduced to the public then, despite the command centre, panic buttons and full co-ordination of CCTV cameras not being operational. 

“We are not reckless by releasing them without the command centre. We have a number they will communicate and work with. The command centre has to be an integrated facility. We are integrating it with Gautrain and Sanral’s gantries. We have to get permission to gain access to these. Municipalities also have cameras and we need to have access to them. That is why the command centre is being reconfigured,” Lesufi said. 

“When we unveil the CCTV and command centre we will be in a position to unveil the panic buttons. They are at an advanced stage. They are testing them. We’ve done the proposals and budgeting and we are having them tested.

“We are working on three forms of panic buttons. The first will be an app on your smartphone, on a fixed pole on a CCTV camera and a small device which can be pressed.” 

A target of 6,000 crime prevention wardens were expected to be recruited. 

The recruitment drive attracted 21,000 applications from across the five regions. After evaluation, 10,650 applicants were shortlisted for the next stage. Of these, 4,000 will graduate on Sunday. More than 200 applicants were sent home because they had criminal records, some were found to have submitted fraudulent matric certificates and others struggled to cope with the intensity of the training. 

A new recruitment process has started to get the remainder of the wardens to reach the target of 6,000. 

“We felt at one stage we’ve set the bar too high for our targets and that we needed to revise our target. But because this was a firm commitment we soldiered on to where we are,” Lesufi said. 

He said wardens were taught to understand the constitution, criminal justice system, and bill of rights and were trained to manage crowd and criminal situations. 

Training took three months. 

The crime prevention team has been established according to Section 334 of the Criminal Procedure Act which gives them powers to arrest and make statements in court. If they misbehave, they will be accountable to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate. 

The wardens will be deployed in the top 40 problematic police stations in the province based on police crime statistics from May 1. 

“We are releasing this force to ensure our people can walk freely in our parks and streets and on their way to work. This is a multiplier force to supplement the police, to  become the ears and eyes of our police, to patrol every street and every ward in our community,” Lesufi said. 

With his ambitious plan, Lesufi wants residents of Gauteng to be able to press a panic button which will send a signal to a command centre. It will locate a nearby police or security vehicle to respond quickly. In instances where a violent crime occurs, such as a cash-in-transit heist, drones will be sent ahead of the police response unit to assess the level of danger at the scene. 

Opposition parties in the Gauteng legislature have criticised his plan, describing it as “pie in the sky”, saying it lacks detail on how the technologies will work. 

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