SSG should exercise restraint in Thamaga

Mmegi Editor | Friday December 19, 2014 10:41

Indeed Thamaga residents should be happy that the SSG presence in their village has given them respite from the notorious gangs that have maimed and killed people. But when the community agreed to a curfew, they would not have imagined that everyone was a candidate for SSG brutality. Now, the Merubisi and Matsaakankane have gone into hiding; and the SSG appear to be venting their frustration on the innocent after failing to apprehend the gang members. 

Who gave the SSG the right to beat up and crush the toes of citizens they find sleeping? Do the SSG have the right to rain blows on a man or a woman they meet during curfew time without even trying to understand why that person is in the streets at that time? True, the SSG need to help the regular police to maintain law and order in Thamaga. But humiliating people, whipping them and arresting them for no good reason is tantamount to declaring marshal law in the village.

The duty of the police is to protect and serve the community. That includes the people they find walking past curfew times. But in Thamaga things are different. Here, the security people terrorise the innocent and threaten to break down doors if citizens do not open. Certainly it is wrong to assume everyone is a gangster or that he/she aids thugs.

The SSG carry deadly weapons, in the form of guns and batons and should they continue behaving in the manner that we hear they are, they will surely kill an innocent member of the community one of these days. In fact the amount of beating they are said to inflict on whoever crosses their path is enough to kill.

aThamaga residents should feel they are better off with the SSG policing their neighborhood, than have gangsters kill them. Finally, the police top brass need to investigate the incidents of torture as reported by this publication, and many others that we could not capture.

The police should have the courtesy to apologise to individuals they offended. Appropriate action should be taken against officer whose names are mentioned in these acts of terror. Yes, the SSG have a mammoth task in fighting gangsters, but society cannot afford to exalt police brutality at the expense of the people they are supposed to protect.