Cape Town - Anti-crime activist Hanif Loonat has given the police top brass details about a syndicate that he alleges is behind some of the recent kidnappings in Cape Town and the killing of businessman Khalid Parker last week.
Loonat told a public meeting called by the interfaith community and civil society attended by, among others, Police Minister Bheki Cele, national police commissioner Fannie Masemola and Western Cape police commissioner Thembisile Patekile, that he had received the information from an unnamed “trusted source”.
Loonat told the meeting, which was hosted by the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC), that his source had told him that the individuals who were arrested for Parker’s killing were released shortly afterwards.
Parker was shot in the head in Imam Haron Road in Lansdowne just after 10am last Friday after he was confronted by three unknown men who fled the scene.
At the time, it was reported that detectives were in possession of CCTV footage and that an arrest was imminent.
Immediately after the meeting ended, Loonat met behind closed doors with Cele, Masemola and Patekile in an office at the MJC headquarters in Athlone and divulged the information from his source to them.
During the meeting, also attended by mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis and Mayco member for safety and security JP Smith, MJC second deputy president Sheikh Riad Fataar said the people of the Western Cape were living in fear.
Fataar asked why the country’s politicians were silent on the spate of kidnappings of local and foreign business people – most of them Muslim – and said the criminals did not fear the authorities.
“I’m going to say the words that our communities of the Western Cape are using. We do not make any exception whether it’s a Muslim or a non-Muslim – whether they are white, black, coloured or whatever. We are gatvol!”
Raziek Rajah, son of Good Hope Construction founder Ismail Rajah, who was kidnapped in Parow Valley and held captive for 111 days earlier this year, told the meeting about the daily trauma suffered by both those kidnapped and their families.
Bangladeshi community representative Rahman Mustafizur said members of his community do not ask for any favours from the State, but felt it was their right to demand security.
He asked the police to create a dedicated anti-kidnapping unit for the Western Cape, as was the case in Gauteng.
Mayor Hill-Lewis told the meeting that the City was “throwing everything it could at crime in the city” and, turning to Minister Cele, said they were ready to assist the police with their technology, such as drones.
Cele told the gathering that he had listened to their demands and said the police would work together with the City and others, integrating resources to fight kidnapping and general crime.
He said he would be happy to be invited back to give a status update on any progress made on the memorandum he was handed by the MJC on behalf of the interfaith community regarding safety and security.