Faith in the police to ‘serve and protect’ is clearly losing momentum, after residents have, over the years constantly been complaining about poor police performance and service delivery in Laudium, with police having done very little to restore the community’s faith, other than continuing to sing the slogan, “together we can fight crime”, which to many residents is just lip service.
Residents have been complaining over a period of time, that not only are police failing to pro-actively combat crime in the area, but also about the poor reactive service received when calling the police to assist, after falling victim to crime and also the lack of proper investigation and communication, once a crime is reported. It is time that the CPF’s who are supposedly representing the community, play their meaningful role of effectively addressing the concerns of the community and if need be, report the unprofessional conduct of the local police to higher authorities, as clearly the poor services rendered by the local police cannot go on without being challenged. It is a constitutional right of each citizen to be protected by the police from criminals targeting them personally or their property, yet police are certainly failing in this regard. In the latest incident of complaints against police, a mother’s appeal for the police to protect her son from threats of harm, has seemingly been ignored and the mother now fears for the health and safety of her son, who seems to have gone into a depression. Trudy Mooloo, a resident of Bengal Street, recently explained to the Laudium Sun, “My son Veni Mooloo, has been acting very weird lately. I tried to talk to him, but still, he has not opened up to me about what is troubling him. I think it is because of the recent incident of him being attacked, whereby he was robbed. He was pointed at with a gun, and his cellphone and other items were stolen, but he does not want to talk about it. Besides the robbery, I know that there is something else going on. Someone has been threatening him. There is a guy known as ‘Bingo’, who came next door to our neighbours and started shouting and making a noise and threatening to burn the vehicles, which are parked in my yard. This guy then just drove off. It is so terrifying that we might have someone who is after my son and our lives, who could be the same person behind my son being robbed. The same guy who was threatening us, once came and almost killed my son with a car. My son was injured on his arm and I had to take him to the doctor. What is extremely worrisome is that the police do not seem to be interested in taking action against the perpetrator. If the cops cannot protect my son, who else should we go to? Should we wait for something serious to happen to my son before the police take action? They just do not seem to be interested. This seemingly is not a high risk crime to the police as they have yet to act. Previously, my son opened a case against Bingo, but my son said it was thrown out of court because according to the cops, my son did not attend the court. But my son says that the police never informed him of the court date and that he had to attend. This shows that something does not add up. It seems that it is true what a lot of people are saying about the Laudium cops; that they work with criminals. I’m so very tired and I am really afraid that I may end up taking the law into my own hands, as I’m helpless and frustrated. Why don’t the police see the danger these criminals are causing us? What can I do, as a mother? I have to defend my son, who is a gentleman. He is not a fighter and he does not quarrel with anyone. Our lives are definitely at risk, as the guy has even threatened to burn our cars.”
Sergeant Simon Chokoe, of the Laudium SAPS, said, “A case of pointing of a firearm has been opened as well as a theft case. No arrests have been made yet. I urge anyone who might have information that could help the police to catch the suspect, to come forward. I would advise the community not to take the law into their own hands, as this would be breaking the law and also would not help to end the crime in our area.”
