Western Cape government wants more policing powers
According to the most recent quarterly crime statistics over 1,300 people were killed in the province.
Picture: Pexels
CAPE TOWN - The Western Cape MEC for community safety and police oversight, Reagan Allen said the increase in the murder rate in the province, shows the need for more leap officers to help crime prevention.
Murders in the Western Cape are up by 8.6% year on year.
This is according to the most recent quarterly crime statistics, for October to December 2023 reporting period with over one-thousand three hundred people killed in the province.
Allen reiterated the need for national government to handover more policing powers to provincial governments.
He said leap officers are deployed in strategic areas to fight crime in the top ten hotspots in the province such as Khayelitsha, Delft, Mfuleni, and Nyanga.
According to the MEC, over 17 illegal firearms have been confiscated in these areas with over 1,900 suspects arrested in January alone.
The provincial safety MEC said "An independent report, by the institute of security studies, already indicates that between the four provinces of Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Eastern and Western Cape, - the Western Cape is the only province that has shown a decrease in the murder rate the last five years."
Allen added that if investigating powers are handed over to leap officers, crime can significantly decrease in the province.