The Select Committee on Security and Justice welcomed the briefing it received from the acting Minister of Police, Prof Firoz Cachalia, and the Western Cape Provincial Commissioner for Police, Lieutenant General Thembisile Patekile, on the strategy to combat gangsterism and extortion in the Western Cape.
The committee heard that the problem of gang-related violence in the Western Cape is exacerbated by competition between rival gang groups for control of drug smuggling routes, urban distribution networks and territorial rivalry for extortion, which often leads to a surge in gun-related deaths.
The committee Chairperson, Ms Jane Mananiso, assured the acting Minister of Police and the provincial commissioner that the committee’s oversight role on the issue is corrective and collaborative rather than judgmental. She said: “Our principled position as a committee is to work together with our sister departments in the justice cluster collaboratively in finding solutions to challenges they are faced with.”
Ms Mananiso called for the memorandum of understanding between SAPS, the Western Cape Province and City to be revived. “We are of the view that we need to engage these collaborative measures robustly to find solutions to these issues,” she said.
Prof Cachalia stated that after visiting the Western Cape and meeting various stakeholders affected by the scourge, his view is that the criminal economy is the cause of these violent upheavals. And that these gangs expand their reach and notoriety by recruiting desperate young people to join their violent franchises. In addition, gang bosses forge not only national but also transnational routes, and have the ability to run their gangs behind prison walls and to infiltrate police intelligence and its procurement systems.
He further conceded that this crisis is now both a social and security crisis for our nation state. As such, he suggested, “It requires the urgent attention of the integrated criminal justice cluster because it’s no longer a social problem but a threat to our national security. And it should not be used as a narrow partisan rhetoric, but a matter of significant importance.”
The operational focus areas of the Western Cape strategy on gangsterism and extortion comprise integrated crime intelligence and data analysis to link different criminal markets; multi-agency cooperation between various criminal justice clusters; flexible task teams capable of addressing overlapping crime threats; collaborative responses; and community partnerships to build trust and support to tackle root causes and gather information. These measures are aimed at moving away from reactive arrests and to long-term disruption of organised crime networks.
Committee member Mr Sifiso Zulu, asked how SAPS will monitor the progress of this strategy. Prof Cachalia replied that SAPS will submit quarterly reports on it to the committee as a means to enforce accountability.
Another committee member, Mr Pitso Noe pointed out that the SAPS is in the news for all the wrong reasons. He wondered if SAPS had the personnel capable of effectively implementing this strategy. The acting Minister then suggested that this crisis is also an opportunity for the SAPS to rebuild and refocus on its intended purpose.
Mr Mzamo Billy asked for the acting minister’s views on the crisis faced by the SAPS’ Crime Intelligence Department that has been ventilated publicly in Madlanga Commission and the Ad Hoc Committee Investigating Allegation Made by Lieutenant General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi. The acting Minister replied that in his view crime intelligence needs to be overhauled completely.
Given the criminality that has infiltrated the SAPS, Ms Mananiso insisted that the committee wants statistics of how many police officers are involved in gang-related criminal cases. Prof Cachalia conceded that there is systemic corruption in the institution, stemming from existing loopholes in its procurement system. He also suggested that much of South Africa’s criminality more generally stems from our lack of a tight procurement regime to safeguard the public purse against fraud and corruption.
Abel Mputing
9 October 2025
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