By Yaseen Kippie

A traumatised cyclist has spoken out after five men armed with pangas and knives robbed a cycling group of their bicycles near Langa.

Abdullah Jaffar, the owner of Jafmed Pharmacy in Ottery, and his fellow cyclists were riding to Stellenbosch when the assailants attacked them on Jan Smuts Drive on Sunday.

Jaffar described the incident.

“It’s a route that we’ve taken for the last four weeks, and we have cycling for years now. We started at 6.30am and as we were heading to Pinelands, as a group of 13 riding closely together, five guys approached, pulled out knives and pangas, and at the tail end of our bunch, forced a few of us off our bikes. We were going at about 35 kilometres per hour, so we hit the tar quite hard. They grabbed three bicycles, and went into Langa over the train tracks. It happened so quickly.”

Jaffar says he feels lucky not to have been accosted and shocked that they were brave enough to attack a group of 13 cyclists, as the usual rule in cycling in public is to stick to a pack.

Head of Safety and Security for the City of Cape Town, Alderman JP Smith, says the attack is unique and promises actions will be taken.

“This is unique, and is not a trend. Attacks are usually on single or two cyclists, but this is unprecedented. Preventative action will be taken, but it is impossible for police to be everywhere, as they have limited resourcing.”

He says high value bicycles has become easy prey as a result of a change in crime patterns since cars have anti-highjacking mechanisms, and homes have defence mechanisms.

Smith also called upon SAPS and the National government to have more convictions of criminals and to raise anti-crime intelligence.

“SAPS should also be called and asked if they have arrested any criminals. Prevention is important, but so too is punishing criminals. Police have a responsibility to investigate crime. But there are too few detectives who are adequately trained. National government has given SAPS inadequate resources, and now 3000 more police officers are being cut in the new budget.”

Should the military be brought in?

JP Smith says the call for the army to be brought in to rid the Western Cape of gangsterism is short-sighted.

“I understand why the call is being made, out of desperation. But army is the wrong philosophy as it’s not sustainable. Military is not trained to do community policing. They are trained to shoot things. They have no power in the criminal justice system. There are no convictions, but more visible security. This is flawed. Until we get that fixed, nothing will work.” [VOC]