Parties ‘scoring cheap points off police killings’
NEWLY appointed Police Minister Bheki Cele has slammed opposition parties for trying to score “cheap political points” over the killing of five police officers in Ngcobo, Eastern Cape last week.
Cele was in Ngcobo on Tuesday, where he was greeted with loud cheers by the local community, and told Parliament yesterday that the officers’ deaths were too serious an issue for the ANC’s opponents to use them to gain political capital, or grandstand.
This came as opposition parties accused the police of poor management and a lack of capacity in the Crime Intelligence Unit, which should have detected plans to attack the police station.
However, Cele said he was too pained to start arguing about what should have happened at Ngcobo. He said that in one week, police had lost nine officers – the five who were killed in Ngcobo, the three who died in a car accident in the area, and another who was killed at Maphumulo in KwaZulu-Natal.
The DA’s Zakhele Mbhele said poor management and training had led to the attack.
Other parties said Crime Intelligence’s poor performance contributed to it. They also accused the unit of fighting political battles in the ANC instead of fighting crime.
Cele said Mbhele should attend the funerals of slain police officers to feel their relatives’ pain, instead of political grandstanding in Parliament.
“As the police, I am pained and traumatised to come here and theorise about what should have happened. I will leave that for later. Sometimes you must attend the funerals so that when you come back you will behave in a human way, rather than an animal way,” said Cele.
“Stay on the understanding that no matter what you think, they remain human beings,” he said of the police.
He also warned the Freedom Front Plus against arming citizens, saying it could lead to mass killings and school shootings, as happened in the US.
Cele said the police would do everything in their power to protect South Africans.
They would also improve the fight against abuse of women and children.
The ANC’s Jerome Maake said Parliament could not have debates on the murders of police every day. He said three years ago, Parliament had debated the same matter, but the killings continued.
The EFF’s Marshall Dlamini said that when the government rescued 18 children at the same church in 2016, the police did not act against it.
This, Dlamini said, should have raised alarm bells about the nature and operation of the church.
The National Freedom Party’s Manzoor Shaik Emam said police were under attack, and needed to be protected. He said the government must not allow criminals to kill them so brazenly. The state needed to take further measures to protect the police.