The Gauteng MEC for Community Safety, Sizakele Nkosi-Malobane led the annual Gauteng Safety Summit with industry experts from various sectors of community at Emperors Palace, Kempton Park on Tuesday (March 26).
The summit was held under the theme “Khuluma Nathi on Safety Issues”, to discuss safety issues affecting Gauteng citizens in their respective policing precincts. The key issues that was discussed include the history of rape in South Africa, the quality of life survey and its implications for safety in Gauteng, violence from a health perspective and its impact on safety, South African Police Service successes and challenges regarding improving the quality of policing in Gauteng amongst others.
The MEC urged the community to collectively discuss safety issues from time to time to measure the impact of our policing in dealing with crime.
“We have to make a deep introspection at the severity of rape and sexual assault in our province, the quality of life survey and its implications for safety in Gauteng, violence from a health perspective and its impact on our safety, innovation in DNA testing, South African Police Service successes and challenges to enable us to enhance the quality of policing”.
Nkosi-Malobane added that the department saw it fit to continue having a gathering of this nature which brings together experts in the various fields to shape their intervention plans and strategies in law enforcement and criminal justice system in general.
“The stakeholders here today are very important sectors and play a critical role in the fight against crime through promoting active citizenry, meaningful community involvement and partnership in safety and security matters”, she said.
The summit was attended by senior leadership from various law enforcement agencies led by Gauteng Police Provincial Commissioner, Lieutenant General Elias Mawela, representatives from National Prosecuting Authority, Department of Health, Home Affairs, Department of Correctional Services, academic experts from various institutions of Higher such as Wits University and the University of the Western Cape.
