Newly elected Mogalakwena Municipality Mayor Cllr Adrina Matsimela addressed the community of Mapela, basing her pep talk on the matter of consideration of each other’s feelings. She first acknowledged traditional dance groups that were present at Mapela Traditional Ground, and also thanked SAPS in the province for visiting Mapela,which has been experiencing worrying criminal activities that she says have to be eradicated.
She referenced her speech to an incident that happened in July 2016 at Mapela, where a woman was murdered and decapitated by a 50 year old Edward Raatji and 33 year old Stanley Mahlake who were charged by Polokwane Magistrate’s Court. The two men were found in possession of their victim’s head wrapped in newspapers near a taxi rank in Polokwane.
Matsemela also asked community members to reconsider ubuntu spirit, emphasising that the above mentioned incident will not be forgotten anytime soon. “When you slit someone’s throat like you do a chicken you really are not considerate of people’s feelings.
In Mogalakwena there are many challenges. We one day wish to hear that there has been a budget allocated to build a police station in Mapela. I say this because we have a community centre office in the area, where inside there is SAPS office which works but is overwhelmed by too much work with limited staff. Given statistics and incidents that happened at Mapela recently there is still much to do. There should be an urgent intervention from provincial SAPS”, said Matsemela. She asked for SAPS programmes to be urgently implemebted at Mapela and promised to work hand in hand with them. The issue of substance abuse seems to top problems in the area, as a source that influences criminal activities.
In terms of respecting the constitution Matsemela encouraged the community to rightfully reap the benefits of democracy by first understanding laws that guide them. By this she was talking against taking law into own hands. The angry residents of Mapela went on a rampage after Raatji and Mahlake were arrested, burning two houses that belonged to their families.
She says the Tin Mine Police Station,which is approximately 35 km from the community has since been in the area during apartheid days and it is not serving the community as it should given the distance and time to respond to calls. She said they are aware of people who sell marijuana to the youth and the community,together with Community Policing Forum (CPF) and Community Safety Forum(CSF)must work together to identify criminal elements within the community.
Matsemela took time to thank everyone who elected her into leadership at Mogalakwena Municipality and in addition apologised for the mistakes committed by previous council at the municipality.
“It was not the intention of the ANC I belong to, that these mistakes were committed under the previous leadership. In addition I thank SAPS for how they worked with us whenever we needed them”
South African Police Service, Correctional Service, Eskom, Community Policing Forum, Community Safety Forum and Traditional Leaders were present at the event.