Guardians of the city ‘can’t look away’
No chance to turn away, Safe City operators, monitoring all the CCTV cameras around Pietermaritzburg, see their fair share of brutal murders and rapes, but owing to the nature of their job, they cannot look away.
Safe City is an initiative that monitors suspicious activities in the CBD and at electricity substations in Pietermaritzburg, via CCTV footage. It has been operating since 2003.
Capita e paper
interviewed some of the Safe City operators to get to know more about what they do on a daily basis.
Ntombenhle Ndlovu, a Safe
City operator, said she started working at Safe City in 2008. Ndlovu described her job as preventing crime and protecting the city and its people.
"Working here has its challenges because we see some very difficult things and sometimes they end up affecting us emotionally and psychologically, but at the end of the day I guess you have to love what you do to conquer these challenges," said Ndlovu.
She said over the years she has seen many scary incidents, from shootings to stabbings, brutal deaths and rapes, on the CCTV camera footage.
"We have to watch everything from beginning to end. If you see someone stabbing someone to death, you can't scream or even look away because you might miss something important. You have to watch [the incident] through to the end because you need to be able to testify in court and recall every little detail of what you saw," said Ndlovu.
A Safe City supervisor, who asked not to be named, said she also experienced some pretty horrific incidents in the past, but there is one she will never forget.
"I can't remember what year it was, but the date was June 16. I recall this because everyone was [dressed up] as per the June 16 tradition.
"I witnessed a man being butchered with a bush knife in a local shisanyama. It was the first time I had seen something so gruesome and it really traumatised me.
"There are other incidents that I've witnessed on the camera footage, but that one was probably the worst. What made it worse was that, at that time, I was already appointed as supervisor in the control room and that also comes with its challenges.
"As a supervisor, I had to be strong. I couldn't show that I was scared and traumatised because I had to be an example for the operators in the control room.
"I had to compose myself and dispatch police officers to the scene because we didn't have one there at that moment," said the supervisor.
She said she has to be able to control herself and the operators in the control room.
"Some of them get scared to a point where they hide under their tables and I then have to reprimand them to get their acts together and continue watching the footage.
"I definitely understand what they go through and the trauma some of these things entail. However, I have to reprimand them because it is part of the job," said the supervisor.
She said the company has an agreement with Life Line to counsel operators who go through traumatic episodes.
"We get counselling from Life Line and I guess it helps, but I don't think it's the same for everyone. For some it helps, but for others it doesn't.
"Personally, I had to counsel myself by telling myself that I'm most probably still going to see this again, or even worse. I also remembered when we started training here that they told us the kind of things we can expect, and that was one of the things they spoke about," said the supervisor.
The supervisor said another challenge is that they do not have access to every single corner or street in Pietermaritzburg.
"The public needs to understand that some areas don't have cameras, so we cannot see crimes that happen in certain areas. However, we have hope because the Msunduzi Mayor, Mzimkhulu Thebolla, has promised to install more cameras for us," said the supervisor.
She added that the public also needs to understand that their job is to see or detect these crimes, and then alert police officers who then respond.
"It does happen sometimes that we detect something and report it. However, the police might not be able to show up in time due to them not having any police vans available or due to them being busy and not having a police officer nearby with other cases at that specific time to respond to the matter quickly. But that does not mean that we did not report the matter," said the supervisor.
The supervisor and Ndlovu both gave tips to residents on how to keep safe in the CBD:
• If you are going to the CBD, stick to what it is you were there to do in the first place and go straight home.
• Some crimes are due to negligence, like for instance, when your phone rings and then you just take it out and answer it in unsafe areas, you are bound to have someone snatch it away from you. Do not take out your belongings in unsafe spaces, rather go inside a shop or somewhere safe and answer your phone.
• There's another trend whereby someone will say leave your bag here and go to a lady who will give you free stuff. You must always know that there is no getting things free, or through the backdoor. If you want something, go to a store, pick your merchandise, pay for it and take it home.
Ndlovu said people have lost the sense of Ubuntu, therefore it is no longer safe to stop and help someone who claims they need help.
"As much as we would love to help everyone, it is impossible because even the elderly are crooks nowadays," said Ndlovu.