House breaking and theft

Steven Ramokhula

Ikemeleng Kroondal

Rustenburg local municipality

12 August 2021

Ikemeleng is known around Rustenburg to be one of the most dangerous communities around the town.

It was known more for its criminal activities from rape, house breaking, theft, armed robbery, murder and many others. The police department could not control the crimes that were happening in the community until community policing forum and streets committees were elected to deal with the crimes. We’ve seen crime dropping rapidly over the years due to the presence of those structures to maintain discipline. Streets were patrolled at night and if anyone was caught doing crime, most of the time community took matters in their own hands to send a strong message to other crime commuters.

The changing of leadership and passing away of others has led to the structures being disbanded. The changing of political structures and leadership played a very huge role in the disbandment of those structures as new leaders turned to elect their own people who have no interest in maintaining discipline within the community.

When criminals realise that the strong structures have been disbanded, they start off with their criminal activities knowing that they are very safe. Their only worry will be the police. Since the beginning of winter, over 12 households that I know of has had a break-in and robbed of their belongings. Usually this criminals are taking electronics and money.

On the 12th of this month another break-in happened where they broke in the room where only the kids were sleeping. They took electrical appliances and their cell phones. Luckily the kids were left unharmed. This criminal activities continue to happen as the pandemic is taking forever and people continue to their jobs.