An eight-year-old, a teenager, a 83-year-old woman and a 43-year-old man were shot dead in Nyanga, apparently by a gang.
|||Cape Town - Four people, among them an eight-year-old and a teenager, were shot dead in Nyanga on Tuesday night, apparently by a gang that moved through the area killing as they went. A seven-year-old child was also shot and wounded in the shooting spree.
Police said on Wednesday that five people in Nyanga, including two children, a teenager and an 83-year-old were shot on Tuesday night.
A seven-year-old was taken to hospital.
Police spokeswoman Constable Noloyiso Rwexana said that, according to reports, the killings started when a 43-year-old man was shot while sitting inside a vehicle at about 18.50pm by two suspects in Sibini Avenue in Zwelitsha, Nyanga. He was taken to hospital where he died on arrival.
Rwexana said at about 11pm three unidentified suspects went to a house in Sibini Avenue where they shot and killed a 83-year-old woman. The suspects proceeded to a residence in Kuqala Avenue in Zwelitsha where a boy aged eight and a 15-year-old girl were shot and killed.
Another child, a girl aged seven, was shot and wounded and taken to hospital.
Nyanga Community Police Forum chairman Dumsani Qwebe said it is believed that the killers were gangsters from New Crossroads and Gugulethu who were looking for the elderly woman’s grandson.
He believes when they couldn’t find who they were looking for, they shot the woman.
Qwebe said the family of the dead woman is traumatised and would need counselling.
“This is hurtful for the whole community because when crime statistics come out we are always number one,” he said.
Nyanga Cluster Community Police Forum chairman Thembela Jacobs said they had been saying for a long time that the Nyanga police station was under-resourced.
Jacobs said they didn’t have enough police personnel or vehicles and the area the local station covered was extensive.
“We need all the help we can get because we don’t have the power of government, or these gangsters,” he said.
Jacobs said another problem was that residents were afraid to report crimes committed by gang members because “some police work with the gangs”.
Anybody with information on the whereabouts of the suspects is requested to contact Nyanga Detectives at 021 380 3320 or Crime Stop at 08600 10111.
Cape Argus
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