Lavender Hill remains a warzone despite army and police surge

Residents of Lavender Hill in Cape Town have said that they are still living in fear despite the deployment of the army and police to the area.

Community members and taxi operators in Lavender Hill, Steenberg and surrounding areas held a peaceful demonstration against gangsterism and incidents related to extortion, on Monday.

According to the latest crime statistics, Lavender Hill is among the 13 areas contributing the highest number of gang-related murders in South Africa.

An army delegation, as part of Operation Prosper, has been deployed to the Cape Flats to assist police in stabilising crime-ridden areas.

Steenberg CPF chairperson Nicola Smalls said since soldiers conducted search operations in the precinct last week, the situation appears to have calmed down.

However, she said more needs to be done to curb the violence.

"The fact that we had a successful operation while the army was deployed into our precinct just shows that there is a need for more boots on the ground, more resources. The communities’ fears are real, the army was here for a short period of time and it's not a sustainable solution," said Smalls.

Lavender Hill community leader Mark Nicholson is not convinced that the army’s short visit will have a lasting impact.

Nicholson said "These drug dealers and these people that are part of this gun violence they knew the army was coming. The message goes out that the army is going to be in Lavender Hill they just hide away their guns, drugs, and nobody becomes violent for a day or two until they're gone and they feel everything is okay and things go back to normal again."