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A spate of political violence has prompted the eThekwini municipality to consider overhauling its security system.A spate of political violence has prompted the eThekwini municipality to consider overhauling its security system.<\/p>\n
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Durban – The spate of political violence in KwaZulu-Natal has prompted the eThekwini municipality to consider overhauling its security system to ensure the safety of its councillors and staff. <\/p>\n
Security concerns were raised by executive committee members during Tuesday\u2019s meeting after Monday\u2019s killing of an IFP member by eThekwini councillor and National Freedom Party member Mzonjani Zulu. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur security system at the city hall is pathetic\u2026 I don\u2019t think they check at all for firearms. There\u2019s no scanning device and, quite frankly, there is more security at a supermarket,\u201d protested DA caucus leader Tex Collins. <\/p>\n
City manager S\u2019bu Sithole said the situation was so tense that the administration was even considering employing extreme measures such as banning the use of cellphones during council meetings. <\/p>\n
He did not say where the budget would be found for additional security measures. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe issue of security is a matter we are discussing with the relevant people in the security cluster.\u201d <\/p>\n
Sithole\u2019s proposal was supported by deputy mayor Nomvuzo Shabalala, who said that \u201cthe communication to shoot would come from a cellphone\u201d, and that to prevent that from happening it was necessary to restrict the use of cellphones during meetings. <\/p>\n
Collins later said Sithole should not get paranoid about the use of cellphones during council meetings, because it was all \u201cpart and parcel of modern technology\u201d. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to tighten up security and get competent staff,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n
Last year, an ANC councillor was reportedly found in possession of an unlicensed firearm inside the city hall, but councillors said that, despite this, security measures had yet to be tightened. <\/p>\n
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The lax security was again in issue recently when metro police barged into the city\u2019s administration offices and threatened to burn down the city hall if their demands for full-time jobs and training were not immediately met. <\/p>\n
City hall security guards struggled to stop the rampaging officers from smashing the glass door to Sithole\u2019s office. <\/p>\n
Eventually the main door was chained by his bodyguards. <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, in KwaMashu hostel, the home of Siya Dlamini, the IFP man who was killed outside the Ntuzuma Magistrate\u2019s Court on Monday, the situation remained tense. <\/p>\n
NFP members said they were leaving their homes as they feared attacks by IFP members. <\/p>\n
The NFP secretary for the eThekwini region, Thabani Mthethwa, said his party had advised its members to leave the hostel, which was dominated by the IFP, until the situation stabilised. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe presence of police does not make our members safe,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
The Mercury established that NFP members had already started leaving the hostel in large numbers two weeks ago, after the abduction of IFP councillor Themba Xulu, who was later found killed. <\/p>\n
\u201cEven before Xulu\u2019s murder, our members had been living under threat. There are many who left even before Xulu\u2019s death,\u201d Mthethwa said. <\/p>\n
IFP members also said they feared for their lives after they received warnings that hit men had been deployed to the hostel to eliminate them. – The Mercury <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
supplied A spate of political violence has prompted the eThekwini municipality to consider overhauling its security system.A spate of political violence has prompted the eThekwini municipality to consider overhauling its security system. Related Stories IFP man shot in front of cops, TV crew KZN cops cannot be trusted: IFP Man shot outside Cape court Respect […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-15679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15679\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}