Winter riot ringleaders ought to be in custody by now

The fact that the president has made a couple of changes to his cabinet and that he has promised us an expert panel to look into the government’s inadequate response to the recent violence and acts of looting should not make us lose sight of what matters most: bringing the perpetrators of the violence and carnage to book.

More than 340 people died in the riots that gripped KwaZulu-Natal and parts of Gauteng in the days following former president Jacob Zuma’s incarceration. Thousands of businesses were looted, torched and destroyed — resulting in billions of rands being lost. Up in smoke went thousands of jobs, along with SA’s reputation as a stable democracy and safe investment destination.

Communities that had lived peacefully with their neighbours suddenly turned to mindless vigilantism, causing the loss of almost 30 lives — some in the most gruesome manner.

Politicians and police tell us it could have been worse. They say were it not for their actions, the fire would have spread far beyond the Reef and would have reached the Eastern Cape, in the south, and destroyed Limpopo in the north.

Repeatedly, police minister Bheki Cele has said one of the dastardly plans fortunately thwarted before execution involved the burning down of a hospital with patients inside it. There are also claims of plans to sabotage water reservoirs, destroy power stations and cut our food supply. All apparently in a bid to get the population angry enough to embark on a popular uprising and cause President Cyril Ramaphosa’s government to resign. Hair-raising stuff. Treasonous.

By now, almost anywhere else in the world, a couple of “co-conspirators” or alleged instigators would have been taken in, at least for questioning. Others would be on the run and their Identikits would be all over the media and public places as authorities tried to nab them.

It is almost a month since the violence, and yet we have seen no evidence of the country’s security services making progress in their investigations into the people who were behind the mayhem.

What we have seen so far is the arrest of a couple of individuals, many seemingly not linked to one another, for posting messages on social media platforms inciting violence.

Though such arrests are important, because all of those who participated in spreading violence need to face the full might of the law, they are of little benefit to the public unless the key instigators are nabbed.

If indeed the state had credible information on the plans to attack the unnamed hospital and the water reservoirs, surely it knows who was doing the planning? How come they have not been picked up for questioning, or arrested?

This ought to be the country’s preoccupation. We should not be so lost in the noise that has accompanied Ramaphosa’s cabinet reshuffle that we forget that there are dangerous men and women out there, some of whom are said by ANC leaders to be elected public representatives and business people, who attempted to burn the country down and may be planning more harm.

If indeed some of the earliest acts of rioting — such as the blockading of a tollgate on the N2 in Zululand a day after Zuma’s arrest — can be linked directly to meetings held by prominent political and business figures in Eshowe and nearby towns, the state should have no difficulty finding those people.

Going for so many weeks without a single breakthrough on the “instigators” erodes the public’s confidence in the police and other agencies responsible for citizens’ safety and security. It causes us to question the state’s claim that it saved us from an even greater calamity.

It further leaves us feeling vulnerable, not certain if another round of violence is imminent.

The president’s new panel of experts will probably do a great job of uncovering the underlying factors that resulted in the state failing to foresee and curtail the riots. But theirs is going to be a long process and will probably spend much of the time probing why the security cluster — led at the time by Cele, then state security minister Ayanda Dlodlo and then defence minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula — met only when there was a crisis. Hence pressure should continue to be on the police, lest the probe goes the way of many unsolved cases, such as the murder of soccer star Senzo Meyiwa.