In this article, Jonathan shares what he learned in a recent meeting with the Lwandle SAPS to learn about CPF structures (Community Policing Forum) and their challenges in the township context. From first contact and getting an introduction to CPFs, to understanding their challenges and thinking about how the FPC can get involved to create a safer South Africa, there is opportunity to benefit a lot of people here.
Leading on from a previous FPC update article in which we said how we need to start doing something (since everything needs to start somewhere), we did just that. The first thing that you learn in civil procedure in law school, is that there is a ‘duty to begin’. This can be either the plaintiff/applicant or respondent, but somebody has to take the first step to get the ball moving, however slowly it may start.
We have long thought about representing the unrepresented, but not in the sense of ‘we stand for the voiceless masses’. The anti-gun brigade is very good at just accepting loads of money from one or two big donors and then proclaiming themselves to be the saviour of people who never even knew they existed. It is the height of arrogance. Instead, we want to meet people in their local context and have a relationship with them. We want their voluntary support on the basis that they know us.
First contact: walking blind into an introductory meeting
We took a first step on 24 June 2025. Our CEO started local (to his context) and visited the nearby township of Lwandle between Strand, Somerset West, and Sir Lowry’s Pass. The purpose was to talk to the local SAPS station commander and learn about the CPF structure and how it operates, and the challenges it faces. We need to understand the environment in which we want to operate if we are to recognise opportunities to get involved and make a success, for everyone. It was a very enlightening 75-minute discussion of listening and asking questions.
It was immediately clear that the Lwandle SAPS personnel have a deep feeling and affinity for their community. Sergeant Gama was helpful and interested in who we were. Being such an early stage to our investigations, we did not have anything to immediately offer (we visited precisely to identify ways in which we could offer something in the course of time).
For those that may not know, ‘CPF’ stands for Community Policing Forum, and it is a link between the local SAPS and the community in which they operate. The SAPS in general has a severe personnel and resource problem, and involving the local community is a way to leverage additional resources, mostly in the form of intelligence. The concept of a CPF does very little operational work in its own name, but it does coordinate.
What is a CPF and what does it do?
The CPF coordinates with more decentralised community bodies, such as neighbourhood watches, street committees, business forums, and similar. The CPF becomes a funnel for feedback on police effectiveness and service delivery complaints, and a channel for information to these community bodies, such as changing crime patterns.
The community bodies provide additional eyes and ears on the ground to provide tip-offs to the local police to act on, and also perform a crime deterrence function (criminals are less likely to act if they think they are being watched or if a response will be quick). The community bodies are usually made up of volunteers and patrol on foot, which helps township police precincts where patrol vans cannot navigate between the rows of shacks.
Typical township CPF challenges
In principle, it is a great concept, but it has practical challenges. These challenges vary from township to township, but Lwandle is in a fairly good position, while others such as Gugulethu might be less so. In some townships, the CPF concept is severely undermined. Townships are filled with poor and desperate people, and also unscrupulous opportunists. While a CPF position may be unpaid, it can be a stepping stone to a paid position in a political party at the local level.
Politics can be a noticeable problem in that a position on a CPF or community body may be occupied by a person who cares nothing for their community. It is a title that grants prestige, and helps bolster their own narrow-minded agenda. This is usually a problem for individuals who want to use it to ingratiate themselves with a political party, and no single party is immune to this phenomenon. They campaign and lobby for the position, and proceed to do nothing once they occupy it. Instead, they try and find the next rung on the political ladder.
Related to the political problem is the issue of community divisions. The local SAPS and CPF structures may lack sufficient legitimacy and credibility in the community. There may even be rival structures. Part of the community may support the work of the CPF, while another part tries to undermine it. At best, the CPF becomes impotent. At worst, its members are placed at risk.
This feeds into a more minor problem in the form of member reliability. The CPF functions on the good graces of its members, but in the context of overwhelming poverty, members can be bribed to not report certain things. They may also feel that they are too close or known to a criminal network or its members, and that they would be killed or threatened if it was suspected that they ‘ratted’ on their criminal intents. It is a ‘minor’ problem because the police will take what they can get, even if it is imperfect information some of the time.
CPFs may also lack critical infrastructure that would facilitate greater effectiveness. While stations are requested to make a dedicated office space available for CPF administration, the reality is that this is often not possible. The CPF is required to make use of any available space at the police station, and they do not have a place to call their own. They cannot meet at their convenience, nor do they even have a desk or printer to call their own. If there is no space available, they must look further afield and use community halls or similar. This obviously undermines their ability to form efficient and sustainable structures and procedures.
There is a real problem of training and equipment. The local municipality may or may not have a functional or responsive department of community safety. In Lwandle’s case, the City of Cape Town has a program to support, but it can be sporadic. Members are lucky to get a day of training on how to be an effective CPF or community body functionary, such as how to de-escalate and avoid confrontations. New members can be very enthusiastic about helping their community, and force confrontations instead of holding back and reporting it to the police. Equipment is also a tricky issue. As small items (flashlights, radios, etc.), it is easy to lose these things and replacement can be costly.
How can the FPC get involved and help?
There are clearly several opportunities to get involved and help improve the effectiveness of township CPFs. Getting involved would put us directly in contact with local people at a grassroots level to build the relationships and trust we need to form a powerful political constituency.
The FPC might be the ‘Firearms Policy Campaign’, but our mission is far broader than mere firearms if you think about it critically. We are fundamentally about safety of the individual and empowering the individual to shoulder that burden for themselves and their family. If enough individuals understand what it means to take responsibility for their own safety, it naturally results in a safer community. This may or may not involve firearm ownership, but having the mere choice and option is important.
The FPC is therefore about ‘community safety’ in a broad sense (this is what our PBO purpose would reflect as with SARS once it is finalised). Scope for involvement includes innovative solutions to providing a dedicated working space, but also limited equipment and soft-skill training (such as first aid, stop the bleed, and conflict management). Fundamentally, we need to provide value in order to create a platform from which we can educate others about firearm ownership.
How could we make this about firearms?
Township firearm owners are factually unrepresented at a political level. When something comes up in Parliament, everybody else is represented: sport shooters, hunters, commercial operators, and the broadly wealthier firearm owning community. Poor firearm owners are not represented, and these are usually black and coloured people living in the townships. In addition to this, township communities may be wary and even fearful of firearms in general, especially the concept of ‘illegal firearms’, but this can be changed through education and demystifying firearms (especially after decades of the anti-gun brigade trying to represent firearms as only being bringers of destruction and death). Who is the average ‘township firearm owner’ though?
When anyone talks about townships (whatever the most prominent demographic living there happens to be), poverty is the most obvious feature for its residents. Unemployment is rife and crime is often of horrendous proportions compared to the suburbs. The firearm owner living here is likely to have what they can afford, such as an old and decrepit pistol or revolver. It could be a Taurus if they are lucky, or more likely a Star, Llama, or Lorcin. If they are licensed, it will probably be section 13. Why do I say ‘if they are licensed’?
The exact legal status of the firearm in question is actually irrelevant, especially if it is possessed in malum prohibitum. To do something ‘in malum prohibitum’ means to do something illegal, but is also morally defensible. Think of a poor person who is a good person and wants to comply with the law, but the law has made their compliance unreasonably and intentionally difficult. They are a victim of a system that has made it intentionally difficult for them to get a licence. They are therefore not a criminal if they are not using it to commit crimes. They simply lack an arbitrary government document to make their possession ‘lawful’. These are concepts that the firearm community needs to learn to grapple with and challenge, rather than accept the talking points and goalposts established by our opponents.
Licensed or not, a good person with a firearm can reasonably be assumed to have taken a direct interest in their own safety. You should only go out and try to change the world if you have your own house and priorities in order. Taking responsibility for yourself and your loved ones is possibly a good marker of someone who could potentially be a leader in their community. All the better if they have proper firearm training on safety and etiquette. We would certainly also like to be able to assist the unlawful possessor in malum prohibitum to become legally compliant.
By approaching the topic of firearm policy from the angle of community safety, we can mobilise individuals who already show a baseline understanding of self-responsibility. By creating community role models out of firearm owners, we create a positive impression of what it means to be a firearm owner. By doing that, we create a culture. By creating a culture, we create a political constituency that we can leverage for more inclusive and more rational firearm policy an laws.