The SAPS national stabilisation plan announced in June has led to a significant drop in cash-in-transit heists, which spiked earlier in 2018, announced Police Minister Bheki Cele in Tshwane on Tuesday.

Cele said 237 suspects had been arrested between 4 April and 4 November and 118 cash-in-transit robberies were recorded, a 36% drop from the same period in 2017 when 184 cases were recorded.

“Since the national commissioner and myself pronounced on the national stabilisation interventions to curb serious crimes, particularly CIT robberies, we have seen less and less of them taking place but we are not out of the woods,” said Cele.

“This is one of the crimes that seem to instil tremendous amount of fear in South Africans.”

The intervention efforts focused on Gauteng, North West, Limpopo and Mpumalanga and Cele said the improvement stemmed from the 72-hour action plan, where teams from Crime Intelligence, the Hawks, investigators and forensic experts focused on getting a breakthrough in a case within 72 hours after an incident.

The minister thanked Crime Intelligence boss Lieutenant General Anthony “Peter” Jacobs, who was appointed permanently in March after a dozen officers had acted in the position in the previous five years. Crime Intelligence has helped arrest 29 suspects in recent months before they committed cash-in-transit heists.

In arrests of suspects accused of committing heists between April and November, police seized 92 vehicles, 78 firearms, 1,402 rounds of ammunition, as well as “a substantial amount of money”.

Police leaders were cautiously optimistic about the success of their operation after statistics released in June showed a rapid increase in heists, with Institute for Security Studies senior research consultant Johan Burger writing: “Cash-in-transit robbery is one of the fastest growing forms of aggravated robbery in South Africa. It poses a significant threat to public safety and South Africa’s economy.”

“They’re not figures that we are proud of, but nonetheless they’re 36% down,” said Cele.

“I can report that we have made significant inroads in breaking the backs of the syndicates involved in CIT robberies. While I am satisfied with the progress, our fight with these criminals is far from over,” he added.

Police Commissioner Khehla Sitole said: “While we might not be winning, we are not losing.”

Cele said the heists have stabilised: “It is evident from the numerous successes mentioned that we are stabilising the scourge of cash-in-transit robberies and that we will continue until we win the war on crime.”

Burger commended SAPS on Tuesday but said it was worrying that they only decided to seriously tackle such crimes after they became a critical problem, with criminals brazenly attacking cash-in-transit vans in daylight, which was embarrassing for the police.

“This is almost to be expected I think given the extent of the attention the police have given this huge increase from last year to this year,” Burger said on the reduction in reported instances.

“All in all, I think the police should be commended,” he added.

Dr Guy Lamb, director of the Safety and Violence Initiative at the University of Cape Town, said SAPS’ use of various resources to target syndicates and the resulting arrests were encouraging but it would be premature to judge the success of the operation.

“It’s really too early to say that there have been significant successes,” said Lamb, pointing to the next release of the annual crime statistics as a better indicator.

“The question is really around convictions,” he added.

Lamb said the police cannot reduce cash-in-transit heists alone and need to share intelligence and work closely with banks and security companies.

Dr Andrew Faull from the Institution for Security Studies’ justice and violence prevention programme said heists are reliably reported and the decline is positive.

“Arrests are also positive but one will want to see suspects convicted,” he added.

Faull said cash-in-transit syndicates are highly organised and police and prosecutors may be at higher risk of corruption.

“So we need to see detectives and prosecutors build strong cases and successfully prosecute individuals if we’re going to disrupt this crime,” he said.

The stabilisation intervention strategy announced in June focuses on cash-in-transit heists, car hi-jacking, murders, house robberies, and gang violence.

Cele said on Tuesday that police have also made “tremendous progress” tackling political killings in KwaZulu-Natal. A task team was established in July and 48 people have since been arrested, but many of those arrested are released on bail.

“To this end we are working very closely with the Justice, Crime Prevention and Security Cluster to ensure a drastic reduction in the granting of bail to these violent criminals. We are confident that with these interactions we can secure more speedy conviction and lengthy sentences in such cases,” he said.

He said 49 people have been convicted on charges related to political assassinations in the province since August 2017. DM