Cele to address Westbury amid claims that ANC ‘doesn’t care about coloured people’

SAPS and Metro Police presence was heavy on Tuesday morning at the Sophiatown police station in Westbury where Police Minister Bheki Cele was believed to be awaiting a meeting with local authorities and community leaders.

This comes after riots had broken out in the crime-ridden community after the death of a 41-year-old woman in a hail of bullets last week Thursday.

Residents were demanding that government look into allegations of corruption at the local police station. They claimed that drug dealers paid certain police officers off and police deliberately turned a blind eye to the scourge of rampant drug dealing, related murders, and turf wars which have made headlines since the year before.

On Monday night a Rea Vaya Station was destroyed with most of the glass walls smashed allegedly by community members. In a video seen by The Citizen, gunshots can be heard in the distance and a group of young men throw objects and break the glass panels.

PICS: Cele listens to violence-torn Westbury, meeting set down

While Cele heeded the communities call to address them after they threatened not to back down, some residents said the violence was still not likely to end. Outside the police station, officers were pleading with angry residents to wait for Cele at the police station.

The Citizen reported on Monday that protestors had vowed not to back down despite the provincial police department agreeing to investigate allegations of police corruption and address their concerns over rampant drug-related crimes.

“The ANC government doesn’t care about coloured people,” a member of a crowd on Fuel Road was heard shouting as South African Police Service (Saps) and metro police nyalas patrolled the area.

Officers intermittently fired shots in retaliation to bottles and rocks being thrown at them from across the road.

Residents highlighted various issues which they said the government had ignored, including a drug turf war which has seen at least 40 people killed this year, according to some residents.

Community members also accused police in the area of colluding with drug dealers and accepting bribes and said the ANC government had abandoned coloured communities.

– Simnikiweh@citizen.co.za

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