Six trucks were torched at Van Reenen’s Pass over the weekend. [Picture: Northern Natal News]
The torching of trucks on the N3 over the weekend is evidence that the security apparatus is unable to forestall civil unrest in the country, according to a security expert.
The torching of six trucks at Van Reenen’s Pass, along the crucial route linking the mining city of Johannesburg with the port city of Durban, comes on the second anniversary of the July 2021 unrest.
Police and intelligence services were widely blamed for their inability to contain the violence as it spread in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal two years ago, resulting in damages worth R50 billion.
As he awaited an intelligence report on the latest incident, President Cyril Ramaphosa said the torching of trucks on Sunday was “concerning.”
“We will be taking steps to make sure that we forestall whatever follow-up activity that those behind this may well be planning,” he said.
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Incapacity
Police were accused of sleeping on the job as the country was razed in 2021. This time, even though some things have changed, they continue to be unable to detect potential violence.
“Things have changed since two years ago. At that point, you had a situation where instability within the governing party spilled over into the rest of South Africa and became a national problem,” said Jakkie Cilliers, Head of African Futures & Innovation at the Institute for Security Studies (ISS).
He said instability would largely remain a threat for the foreseeable future, as long as poverty, inequality and unemployment remain stubbornly high.
“The systems that are supposed to manage this are not working. To fix those structural problems, we first need to get loadshedding out of the way, to enable the economy to grow again. Until such time, we are dependent upon the police and other agencies of the state to try and keep a lid on the system,” he said.
But, of course, the latest incident was “just another example of their apparent inability to forestall these kinds of events”.
