Winde cites marginal improvements in Western Cape crime levels

CAPE TOWN - Western Cape Premier Alan Winde insists that there have been marginal improvements in the level of crime in the province, even though it’s not felt daily by residents.

He’s been severely criticised by opposition parties for not spelling out a plan in his Opening of Parliament Address to meet his government’s promise of halving the crime rate within five years.

However, Winde said they should provide solutions instead of only criticising.

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The premier was heckled and interrupted repeatedly while responding to backlash from opposition parties that his government is failing to spare the lives of the province’s most vulnerable, who are impacted by crime every day.

Winde said statistics showed the crime rate in the province has dropped, and with 4,000 murders annually, the Western Cape is no longer the crime capital it used to be.

While the National Coloured Congress (NCC)’s Duwayne Jacobs said Winde was misleading the House, Winde said he was open to being proven otherwise.

“Yes, it gets worse. It’s unacceptable. It needs to change. We need another model. We need to try something else. We are doing that in this province with the safety plan. We are trying something else.”

Winde said more attention must be paid to violence prevention.

“That’s the real work that’s got to happen. You cannot police your way out of the murder rate that we have, in whichever way policing is done.”

Winde said the province cannot fund crime prevention programmes falling outside its mandate.