DA calls for drugs bureau after teen deaths
The drug-related deaths in KZN demonstrate the urgent need of SAPS specialised anti-drugs units, the Democratic Alliance said.
|||Durban - The proposed SA Police Service (Saps) specialised anti-drugs units need to be established urgently, as demonstrated by the latest drug-related deaths in KwaZulu-Natal, the Democratic Alliance said on Sunday.
Police Minister Nathi Nhleko should speed up the roll-out of Narcotics Enforcement Bureau units in priority policing clusters to crack down on illicit drug trafficking following the tragic drug-related deaths of at least four young people in KwaMashu, Durban, this week, DA spokesman Zakhele Mbhele said.
“After President [Jacob] Zuma announced that these specialised anti-drug units would be established, I wrote to minister Nhleko requesting information on the detailed implementation plan for the Narcotics Enforcement Bureau, but to date there has been no response,” he said.
This should not be a difficult task. The SAPS should start by reconvening what was left of the personnel who constituted the specialised anti-drug units that were disastrously disbanded by former national police commissioner Jackie Selebi in 2006.
The next step should be to identify priority clusters where the initial reconstituted units would begin their focussed investigations and intelligence-led policing operations.
The 2014/15 crime statistics already provided an evidence-based guideline which would indicate that KwaMashu should be a priority surveillance area because it lay between the two KwaZulu-Natal police precincts that registered the highest number of drug-related crimes in the province - Durban Central and Phoenix, Mbhele said.
Setting up a task team to address the emerging crisis, as had been reported, was not adequate to ensure a long-term, sustainable solution.
The task team approach had been the “default modus operandi” of the SAPS to deal with syndicate crime since specialised units were disbanded, from vehicle hijacking to gang violence, but its impact had always been short-lived and failed to stop year-on-year increases in drug-related crime and aggravated robberies.
“The DA expresses its condolences to the families of the four young people whose lives were prematurely cut short by toxic drugs that ravage too many communities and sympathises with the 36 others who were critically affected after ingesting the so-called ‘Mercedes’ concoction.
“This tragic turn of events should spur the police minister and [SAPS] top brass to hasten the implementation of the specialised anti-drug units in order to minimise more innocent deaths in future,” Mbhele said.
According to media reports, the teenagers died after suffering symptoms of poisoning allegedly from a new form of ecstasy, known as “Mercedes”, while celebrating at an end-of-term party.
African News Agency