Mel Frykberg

Members of Johannesburg’s metro police, without name tags, tried to prevent The New Age on Monday from photographing and documenting a raid by its members on street vendors operating illegally in the CBD.

The New Age was investigating the reality, and the hardships faced by street vendors trying to eke out a living on the mean streets of Johannesburg, following a brutal weekend raid called Operation Festive Season.

The raid was a joint operation involving the Metro police, the Tactical Response Team and members of the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) after the SAP requested back-up from the military.

Photographs taken at the weekend showed a number of vendors being humiliated and beaten up by soldiers, including one vendor who was repeatedly clubbed with the back of a R4 assault rifle.

Locked shops were forcibly broken into as soldiers and police smashed padlocks with crowbars and hammers, assisted by the firefighters using jaws-of-life.

Police spokesperson Supt Longelo Dlamini told The New Age the raid was aimed at transit crime and vendors and shopkeepers selling stolen clothing and goods.

While many of the vendors are illegal immigrants and the police have to control illegal activity, The New Age learned that many of the police are more interested in lining their own pockets than enforcing law and order.

“They confiscate our goods and then we see the same goods being sold on the streets by other vendors,” said Laura Mancha (22) from Mozambique who relies on the R300-a-week she earns to support nine family members back home, all of whom are unemployed.

Metro Police spokesperson Wayne Minaar told The New Age that if the media was not interfering with police operation, the media had every right to take photos. Any complaints against the police could be laid through the police department’s internal affairs.

melf@thenewage.co.za