Police Oversight and Communiy Safety
With reference to neighbourhood watch (NHW) structures in the City of Cape Town:
(1) (a) What is the total number of registered and accredited NHW members in the City of Cape Town, broken down by area, (b)(i) what is the total number of NHWs per police precinct that are not registered and accredited and (ii) why are they not registered and accredited and (c) what forms of support (financial, training, resources, equipment or other) have been provided to these NHW structures (both accredited and non-accredited) by her Department;
(2) whether all registered NHW members have received formal training; if not, (a) what percentage has been trained and (b) what is her Department’s plan to ensure full training coverage?
(1) (a) The Department currently has 317 accredited NHW structures in the City of Cape Town. This figure changes month to month as all NHW structures accreditation expire after two years. So, in any given month, some NHW structures accreditation will expire, while others will be newly accredited or reaccredited. See attached Annexure A.
(b) (i) The Department only deals with accredited NHW structures. We do not know what the number of non-accredited NHW structures is.
(ii) Accreditation is voluntary and any NHW structure may apply to be accredited. The Department does advocacy in the various communities and encourages non-accredited NHW structures to apply for accreditation.
(c) All accredited NHW structures receive a Starter Kit and a Certificate of Accreditation. The Starter Kits contain the following items:
- Storage Container
- T-shirts
- Peak Caps
- Beanies
- Reflective Bibs
- Lanyards
- NHW Branded PVC Banner
- Drawstring bags
- Safety Whistles
- Torches
- First Aid Kits
In addition, the Department also provides warm winter jackets to selected accredited NHW structures. During the 24/25 financial year a total of 1182 jackets were distributed to 77 NHW structures in the City of Cape Town. Thus far, 625 jackets have been distributed to 40 NHW structures during the current financial year. The number of jackets that the Department can procure and distribute is dependent on the available budget.
During the 24/25 financial year, the department funded the projects of a total of 115 accredited NHW structures in the City of Cape Town. Ninety-three (93) of these structures received R10 000 and the remaining 22 (in crime hotspots in the City) received R25 000. The total amount funded to NHW structures in the City of Cape Town amounts to R1 480 000. For the current financial year, 30 NHW structures in the City of Cape Town have thus far received R10 000 funding each, amounting to R300 000.
No support can be provided to non-accredited NHW structures
(2) All NHW structures are invited to apply for training, however due to budget constraints the Department is only able to provide a limited amount of formal training to the NHW structures.
(a) Fifty (50) NHW structures will be trained during the current financial year. Twenty-six (26) NHW structures will be trained on Conflict Mediation and 24 will receive Basic NHW training. This represents a percentage of 10,39% NHW structures that will receive training this financial year.
(b) The Department is unable to provide full training coverage with the current budget and human resource allocation.
