Safety Partnerships in Action

On Thursday, 10 April 2025, Premier Alan Winde hosted a digicon focusing on the efforts of the Western Cape Government and the City of Cape Town (CoCT) to combat and prevent crime.

The digicon came after the first Safety Cabinet Committee meeting of 2025. The committee brings together various provincial Cabinet ministers and other stakeholders to discuss issues related to safety and security.

At the meeting, officials from the Western Cape Department of Police Oversight and Community Safety gave a briefing on updates and revisions to the provincial Safety Plan.

Premier Winde stated, “Fighting crime is mainly a national government competence, but because we know that it has such a major impact on our residents’ lives, we must step in where we can and push for more resources and powers coming to competent governments like ours. Crime impacts us in so many ways: it affects our economic growth aspirations, as well as business confidence, and leaves residents feeling insecure and, in many cases, hopeless. This is why we must constantly adapt and evolve our crime-fighting strategies while also addressing the root causes of crime. We cannot simply stick to the same plan and expect different results. The Safety Plan is a work in progress. This is intentional. We must be alive to the fact that criminals, extortion syndicates, and gangs are always looking at ways to adapt, at the expense of our residents, their dignity, and ultimately our economy. And so, we must continuously adapt.”

Provincial Minister of Police Oversight and Community Safety, Anroux Marais, and Alderman JP Smith, CoCT Mayoral Committee Member for Safety and Security, were the Premier’s guests at the digicon.

Minister Marais emphasised that the development of the Western Cape Safety Plan “Version 2.0” is under way and is based on the whole-of-government and whole-of-society approach. “We alone cannot tackle this scourge. Our municipalities, their law enforcement officers, the South African Police Service, along with community-based structures such as neighbourhood watches, all play a critical role,” she stated.

Ald. Smith focused on some of the successes of the Law Enforcement Advancement Plan (LEAP) – a joint initiative between the provincial government and CoCT. LEAP officers are currently deployed in 6 areas in a double-up deployment: Delft, Khayelitsha, Phillipi East, Nyanga, Mitchells Plain, and Gugulethu. A reaction unit is also deployed in areas where LEAP officers are not operational. Since LEAP’s inception in 2020, more than 40,000 arrests have been made, and 739 illegal firearms have been taken off the streets and counting. Outside of the metro, the Western Cape Government partners with various municipalities in funding and deploying Rural Safety and K9 Units.

Many municipalities in the Western Cape, including the CoCT, are increasingly integrating technology and innovation into their crime-fighting arsenal. “An important tool that is helping us to take that massive number of firearms off the streets is the gunfire detection system (Shot spotter),” Ald. Smith said. Shot spotter is currently operational in four high gun-crime areas in the city and is to be further expanded. Last year, CoCT Law Enforcement officials confiscated 120 illegal firearms and imitation guns in these areas thanks to this technology. Dashcams or in-vehicle cameras (IVCs) and body worn cameras (BWCs) are also being rolled out:

• 1250 BWCs have so far been rolled out.
• 290 IVCs have been installed to date.

“These kinds of technologies are helping us tremendously,” he stressed.

Premier Winde pointed out that innovation is key to the Safety Plan’s success, “Where we encounter challenges in efficiently utilising our women and men in blue, technology helps us. Just like LEAP is a force multiplier, so too are the likes of Shot Spotter, dashcams and drones. But the fact remains that the SAPS in the Western Cape is grossly under-resourced. If we had more authority and resources for policing, this would be among our first priorities: sufficiently equipping the SAPS and municipal law enforcement with the resources they need to combat crime effectively.”