SOWETO residents held a community indaba to address the social challenges and try to find implementable solutions on Thursday, 7 December.
Founder of Soweto Speaks, Musa Mbewe, a platform used by residents to voice their concerns with the aim of finding solutions, said her role in the community is finding solutions to challenges that people are facing.
She said she's tired of seeing people keeping quiet when things go wrong before their eyes, and all they are interested in doing is taking pictures and videos for content purposes without offering any help.
She told Daily Sun that as a victim of rape, she wouldn’t want other people or girls to go through what she experienced.
“A bad thing happened to me. I was abducted in broad daylight, and people could see what was happening; no one offered to help me, no one tried to help. I was then raped, and I don’t want anyone to go through this because I know the pain that comes with it, so I will stand and fight for the community,” she said.
She said that people should unite not tell themselves that if something hasn’t happened to them, it won’t.
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“Umuntu ngu muntu nga bantu. We need to take care of each other. We all need to be accountable for what happens in the community,” Musa said.
Police commissioner Major-General Max Masha said she's grateful to the people who organised this event after realising that the community should also take responsibilty and stop blaming cops when things go wrong in their areas.
“The sense of being a community is no longer here, and it’s everyone for himself and God for us all. We, as police, are 100% behind working together with the community to prevent crime from happening,” he said.
He said that a major part of policing must be done by the community, adding that he encouraged the community members to be mindful of their neighbours and not just watch when something goes wrong.
