CPF asks electricity minister to exempt 'murder capital' Delft from power cuts
'There are more people dying in Delft currently than in warzone countries, which is very sad. The majority of the killings are gang-related, it's kind of just becoming the norm for Delft to be labelled as the murder capital of South Africa,' says Delft community policing forum's Charles George.
CAPE TOWN - The Delft community policing forum said that ongoing load shedding was creating an environment for gangs to operate freely in the crime-stricken Cape Town suburb.
The CPF's Charles George said that 20 people had been killed in the area this month.
"There are more people dying in Delft currently than in warzone countries, which is very sad. The majority of the killings are gang-related, it's kind of just becoming the norm for Delft to be labelled as the murder capital of South Africa. It's mainly gang-related and in between we have a lot of innocent people being caught up."
The forum has written to the electricity minister asking for Delft to be exempted from the controlled power cuts at certain times and it's organised a march for later this month to draw attention to the issue.
"We've tried everything. At the moment, I would say close to 90% of the murders takes place during load shedding. And we've been asking, can we not be exempted from load shedding at night. Delft at night is pitch, pitch dark and when these shootings occur, we can't see anything - we don't know the colour of the car, we don't know what the perpetrators were wearing, even with regards to some places where we have CCTV cameras up."
