Help, the cops are coming!
South Africa's men and women in blue have been behaving like violent criminals and there is a rot developing within our policing bodies.
What is going on in the police force? Have the lunatics taken over the asylum? As South Africans we are only too aware that we live in a country that has one of the highest crime rates in the world. But a depressing realisation is setting in that we are in danger not only from those in civilian clothes - there is an increasing trend for our criminals to sport police uniforms.
Or so it seems, if the events of the past few weeks are anything to go by.
As a taster, take 15 minutes of SABC television news one night last week. It was so shocking that it beggared belief. I do not do violence very well, in real life or in the movies. I hate conflict, dodge it where I can and go to great lengths to steer clear of watching gory scenes on screen. It is not often that I have to take avoidance measures while watching the news. But the broadcast last week had so much violence in it that it became unwatchable.
The violent scenes on the screen were all home-grown. The brutality would have been shocking whoever the perpetrators were, but it was even more outrageous given that the men meting out the violence were South African policemen.
Two of the three offending news items comprised amateur footage of policemen caught in the act of brutally assaulting people. In one excruciating clip, a policeman was filmed beating and kicking a young boy whose hands were tied behind his back. The attack was gratuitous and continued even after the boy had collapsed.
The second item showed a policeman beating a man who was lying face down on the ground with his hands tied behind his back. The man in uniform repeatedly hit the victim on the back of the head. The attack went on interminably. The man on the ground tried to defend himself, an impossible feat given that he was prostrate
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