Move to cashless to avoid CITs and kidnappings, Mkhwanazi urges business

KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi is confident moving towards a “cashless society” will go a long way in alleviating business-related crime.

Mkhwanazi believes most of the crimes affecting businesses such as cash-in-transit (CIT) robberies and kidnapping of business people are linked to cash.

“That is why we are preaching to business that they must start to introduce a cashless society. If we can start there by removing that [it] would be a start of preventive measures.”

Mkhwanazi was speaking in Durban on Tuesday where police met business stakeholders to lobby support for crime fighting initiatives and strategies.

Asked about crime that mainly affects businesses, Mkhwanazi said it was organised CIT robberies.

He noted these affected all but one cash-transporting company which he did not name. This raised questions about the targeted companies' internal controls and the possibility of inside jobs. 

“The problem in most cases is internal. Not once is a cash vehicle bombed while empty. They wait until those vehicles have a certain amount of money inside before they bomb it,” he said.

“Knowledge of the movement and contents of vehicles is information that is supposed to be within that specific company, but it finds its way to the criminals. That’s why criminals are able to plan these robberies. It's not sporadic incidents but it's organised and targeted to a specific vehicle, they won’t attack any other vehicle.”

He said the reason there is one specific company which doesn't fall victim to this crime is because it has its house in order internally.

The modus operandi of robbing cash vans usually involved the hijacking of luxury vehicles such as Mercedes-Benz because they provide the robbers better protection when the airbags pop out if they ram armoured cash vehicles.

However, of late the vehicles are being replaced by small sedans similar to those used for e-hailing, such as VW Polos.

“They [guards] tell you they were stopped by these small sedans, got out of the armoured cars and were robbed of their firearms and the money. It tells you there’s something deeper we need to deal with, it’s not just the mere stopping of vehicles.”

He further expressed concern about the number of firearms getting into the hands of criminals during these robberies.

“What we find is they [guards] simply surrender, and for every heist you are guaranteed firearms will be taken from security guards. By so doing, arming the criminals further and creating more challenges as a province and country.”

Mkhwanazi said analysis of these incidents and the kidnapping of business owners suggests the common factor is the availability of cash.

“The target is a specific group of business people, not many others. It could be because of the availability of cash, maybe they are so vulnerable it’s easy for them to pay off those ransoms.”

He said police have been engaging legislators and business people to consider going cashless.

“We have made proposals, as SAPS, to review the legislation that governs the movement of money by first determining the type of vehicles used.

“For business, the engagements we’re having is they must start reducing the amount of cash used by declaring a lot of sites to be cashless so people use their cards to pay.

“ If people are using cards or cellphones to pay, it makes life much easier for us.”

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