The dramatic surge of violent Cash-In-Transit robberies in South Africa has the cash services industry fighting back.
If you’re moving money, it could all end in tears, gunfire and a sickening explosion. This is the misery of the road in the Cash-In-Transit (CIT) business in South Africa.
With over 180 heists in the first seven months of this year alone, injuring at least 62 guards and killing seven, private business is trying to find ways to make money out of thwarting these thieves.
“The challenge is that this is such a sophisticated level of crime that everyone in our industry is really looking at it and saying this is really difficult to combat. This is quite tough,” says Roy Alves, the Sales Director of Axis Communications.
The Swedish company has been manufacturing security cameras in South Africa for the last two decades. It’s been approached to assist with its technology in combating CITs.
“What we’re seeing is that this is an organized crime. This is not a random hit on a vehicle carrying cash. This is syndicated crime that has intelligence. They’re either listening on radio frequencies, or listening on telephone conversations, or having information on the roots of these vehicles,” says Alves.
The leading providers of security equipment to the CIT and banking industry, AllCash Technologies, hosted a high-level panel discussion recently in Midrand, Johannesburg, which looked at ways to impede these heists.
Interpol’s #TurnBackCrime campaign Ambassador, Andy Mashaile, was one of the panelists.
“In 2017, 136 billion rands went through the veins of the financial system, and out of 10 heists, 465 million [rands] was stolen. Only 33 million [rands] of that was recovered,” said Mashaile.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/cover-story/2016/09/01/terrible-time-list-bank/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: ‘A Terrible Time To List A Bank’</a>
The other two panelists were Guateng province’s MEC of Community Safety, Sizakele Malobane, and retired police crime statistics expert and independent analyst, Dr Chris de Kock.
Malobane pulled no punches in giving the perpetrators of CIT heists a stern warning.
“We want to send a message to criminals that we are aware of your arrogance and we’ll deal with your arrogance decisively.There are many ways to deal with it. We can actually respond either by protecting the money… also, we can return fire with fire,” said Malobane.
The use of high-caliber firearms in CIT heists has raised many eyebrows. 
De Kock came armed with statistics that posed crucial questions to the panel. He said 11% of these robberies involve high-caliber firearms.
“These firearms should not be in the hands of the public at all. We’re talking of R4’s (rifle), R5’s (rifle), AK’s (AK-47) and whatever,” said De Kock.
In response, Malobane dispelled some of the suspicions around police involvement.
“It’s not only from the police that these arms are coming from. Most of them, honestly speaking, are actually coming from other countries. These are the kind of weapons that are not used or legal in South Africa, that get used in the process of committing that particular crime,” said Malobane.
Just outside the discussion, AllCash Technologies demonstrated ways to help combat the scourge of CIT heists.
It showed the use of its vehicle vault protection device, called the protection dispensing unit.
The unit is for the protection of assets in the vault area of the vehicle. Once activated, it releases a solid block of polyurethane foam, which envelopes the money, and then hardens into a solid block within two minutes.
In the case of an attempt to blow up the cash van, the explosion hardens the foam, which absorbs the blast.
Also in display here was the Cash Defender MK3, designed to allow the safe movement of bank notes outside of a cash van.
Once activated, it releases smoke and stains the banknotes, rendering them useless. 
Back at the panel discussion, the mining industry, and the use of its explosives in these heists, also came under scrutiny.
“Before we even investigated some of the mining companies, some of them approached us and indicated that ‘we suspect that our explosives are the ones that are being used for CIT’, but not only for CIT, they’re also used for the illegal mining by zama-zamas [hustlers]. So there is an investigation there and I hope that very soon we’ll actually be cracking that particular case,” said Malobane.
For the Interpol ambassador, it was the dark web that was of concern.
Mashaile said 90% of the internet’s usage lies within the dark web, where criminals meet.
“Me and you, and your viewers only use about 10 percent of the internet. The deep web, or dark web, is where a lot of crime is committed. That’s where you can access the hitman industry. That’s where your masterminds in heists meet and communicate freely on that space of the deep web and the dark web,” said Mashaile.
To the crime expert and retired police statistician, the real concern lies within the patterns picked up from his experience.
De Kock says before he left the police in 2013, one of the patterns he noticed was that once one crime is seemingly combatted, criminals move on to the next.
“When we started to manage these figures down from 394 (heists per year) to 182 (heists); 145 (heists) when I left, when it was managed down, it immediately jumped from CITs to ATM bombings. So we must be very careful…the moment you do something, in sociology, we say you have unforeseen consequences,” said De Kock.
Police, government, security companies and the South African community as a whole have had enough of CIT heists. 
For now, the weapons against them are vigilance smoke and foam.

Crime scene blurred law enforcement and forensic background

South Africa Fights Back Against Cash Heists

It’s a sunny winter’s day at Avalon Cemetery, in Soweto, and there are rows of graves as far as the eye can see. For nearly 50 years, thousands have been buried here. We find 50-year old Dan Makete knee deep in a grave, digging out the dry soil for yet another burial.
“This is one of the few places I can ever find work. I get so comfortable, it’s like home,” he says.
Makete is one of thousands of ex-prisoners struggling. It is a sad story that began in 1995; the days of democracy and hope for South Africa were days of despair for him.
“Life was tough back then and I got involved in terrible things. I was arrested for armed robbery, house break-ins and hijacking,” he says.
The price was an 18-year jail term.
“Six of those years were suspended and because of good behavior, I served nine years [and] six months.”
But good behavior didn’t mean rehabilitation.
“Prison wasn’t correctional. I was in jail for a very long time but I didn’t get a skill or any kind of empowerment. We spent days doing nothing. The best you could do was work in the kitchen, dairy or maybe in the garden,” he says.
According to Makete, there was no counselling, meaning he went back to crime.
“When I got out for the second time, I had a different mind-set and wanted to make sure I don’t go back to crime. I have managed to stay clear of that but it is tough. I can’t find a decent job because I have no skill and employers don’t take people with criminal records.”
Makete takes any menial job that comes his way. One of them is cleaning and digging graves at the cemetery.
“If you aren’t strong enough you will go back to prison because there is nothing you can do. While I was in prison we fought, by hunger strike, to try convince them to empower us but there was never a response and if there was, they would promise but nothing would happen.”
Makete says he feels rehabilitated, but unskilled.
“I don’t see myself going back to prison because I have learned my lesson but the pain is I have been out of prison for years but there is a big stigma. You are used as an example. I have heard people say, ‘don’t be like that useless one’,” Makete says in a low voice.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2015/02/01/better-live-hell-south-african-prison/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">&#8216;It&#8217;s Better To Live In Hell Than A South African Prison&#8217;</a>
With three children to support, life is tough, yet there is help at hand.
Founded in September 1910, the National Institute for Crime Prevention and the Reintegration of Offenders (NICRO) specializes in helping people like Makete. It directly helps 12,000 to 15,000 people a year.
“This is a huge challenge because many of our ex-prisoners cannot find work because of the criminal record and sometimes it’s impossible. We were hoping to get enterprises up and running in order to employ ex-prisoners but it has not materialized yet,” says NICRO CEO, Soraya Solomon.
The vast majority of South African employers disqualify applicants with a criminal record. NICRO calls for employers to be more lenient.
“Aside from this practice being unconstitutional and a derogation of the right to equality and non-discrimination, a considerable part of the problem of crime in South Africa is that most offenders who wish to lead a crime-free life are prohibited from doing so because of their past actions. Having a criminal record for a less serious offence which occurred years ago should not be used to bar someone from gainful employment today,” she says.
Solomon recognizes that successful job applicants sometimes need to have no criminal record, especially for a particular type of offence, but says a balancing of rights is necessary.
For the system to work, she says rehabilitation must start as soon as the offender arrives in prison. The problem is there is overcrowding, few staff and low pay. It means a small percentage of prisoners have access to services to assist them in changing behavior. Upon release, most NGOs, like NICRO, do not have the money to help. In 2013, according to Solomon, about 23,000 inmates were released from South African correctional facilities while another 25,000 entered the system each month.
“Clearly the influx of prisoners will continue to be a problem and facilities will experience ever-increasing overcrowding and worsening prison conditions. We need to think beyond this present crisis in order to find sustainable solutions,” says Solomon.
Solomon and her team are attempting to find such solutions. They offer services for youth at risk, young people in conflict with the law, diversion services and non-custodial sentences served outside of prison that equip offenders to rehabilitate and reintegrate into society. Additionally, NICRO has designed a comprehensive community-based initiative to manage and significantly reduce the number of remand detainees in correctional centers.
“NICRO’s remand solution has been designed to  reduce prison overcrowding and the processing time of offenders, prevent low-risk offenders from being sent to prison while on remand, provide much-needed and often overlooked key services, such as victim and trial support, preparation for incarceration, restorative justice interventions and professional comprehensive assessment to reduce recidivism,” Solomon explains.
Clinical psychologist and criminologist, Craig Traub, agrees with Solomon. He says the criminal justice system is more retributive than rehabilitational.
“Unfortunately prison systems, without bounds of stimulation, tend to be systems to improve criminality and criminal behavior in terms of skills, deception, and familiarity. Being a warden and nursing staff in prison is tremendously noble and dangerous. In that, increased employment packages for these workers would benefit the system as a whole,” says Traub.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2016/09/01/prison-cell-red-carpet/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">From Prison Cell To Red Carpet</a>
In the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services’ (JICS) 2015/2016 annual report, Inspecting Judge Johann van der Westhuizen found only 46% of centers visited had permanently employed educators. To make it worse, some centers in small rural areas did not offer any education, rehabilitation or vocational opportunities.
“We were informed that inmates who wish to further their education are transferred to centers with educational facilities. This, however, results in the inmates being transferred further away from their family. This in turn limits visits and the family interaction that is crucial for a successful reintegration into the community,” says Van der Westhuizen.
To make matters worse, inmates sentenced to 24 months or less do not take part in any programs but are rather considered for parole on completion of a quarter of their sentence in terms of section 73 (6) (a) of the Correctional Services Act.
It is a problem that lawyers can fix, but it comes at a high price. This means the poor, like Makete, suffer more while those who have done worse get off more lightly because they have money.
According to Traub, the poor sometimes suffer because forensic workers are overloaded; DNA/fingerprint measures aren’t always done in time, evidence goes missing, is stolen or sold, and oversight mechanisms to prevent police and government corruption are laughable.
“Again, those who are better educated and skilled have a higher likelihood of gaining employment, despite their record, than those who are not,” says Traub.
Traub says to better prepare prisoners for reinsertion into the society we need more halfway houses for prisoners, similar to those of addict rehabilitation. These would incorporate a gradual step-by-step facility, general reintroduction, skills-of-daily-living workshops and a person who can facilitate such a move.
If ex-offenders are able to find lawful employment, there are broad social benefits. According to Solomon, in a German study, the re-offending rate was reduced by 30%, and in the US by 20%. In South Africa, she says, the government would save about R7.3 million ($550,000) a month if 20% less of the 4,300 offenders released monthly did not re-offend.
“For that reason alone, reintegrating ex-offenders and supporting employment as a key part of that process is in everyone&#8217;s interest,&#8221; says Solomon.
The government may be trying, but not hard enough.
South Africa tried a restorative justice system, during the transition from apartheid South Africa to a free one, through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). Here, a criminal would return or give something the aggrieved requires or deserves, for example through a truth-telling testimony. Some would argue that this system played a role in rehabilitation.
Another problem is the country’s criminal record system. For example, in some cases diversion – a process to steer lower risk offenders away from the criminal justice system while still holding them accountable for their actions, by making the offender perform some sanction, such as attending a behavior change program or counselling, pay a fine or perform unpaid community service – doesn’t work.
“A person who is diverted does not have a criminal record. However, it has come to NICRO’s attention that despite being diverted, a number of people report that a criminal conviction has been recorded against their name. This is typically found out when a person applies for a job or a visa for travel,” says Solomon.
According to Solomon, this is the result of a clerical error between the court clerks and the South African Police Services (SAPS) and can be corrected by approaching the court clerk, where the diversion was ordered.
“There are many incidents where adults committed a less serious offence when they were younger and find later in life that they cannot obtain employment or educational bursaries. At the same time, other people who have committed similar offences are being diverted without any criminal record,” she says.
To add to that, South Africa’s criminal justice system allows for a criminal record to be expunged. The tricky part is the offender must wait 10 years before applying. This means although ex-prisoners, like Makete, have served their time, they may continue to pay for their crimes once released.
“In many of these cases, the period of 10 years of being unable to travel, obtain employment and, in many cases, being unable to study further, embody sanctions that are more severely punitive than the offence warrants,” says Solomon.
Without enough rehabilitation programs, South Africa has a cancerous crime problem. It is so bad that a First National Bank study found that crime was one of the reasons hundreds of South Africans were selling their homes and moving overseas.
It sees the cost of crime far outweighing the cost of rehabilitating criminals.

The Grime That Comes With Crime

It has been three years since the Central Bank of Nigeria introduced the <a href="https://www.cbn.gov.ng/cashless/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Cashless Nigeria Policy</a>. Its aim was to encourage the use of electronic systems for all monetary transactions.
The policy has yielded <a href="https://www.vanguardngr.com/2012/11/cashless-policy-has-come-to-stay-cbn-2/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">benefits</a>: it makes many transactions simpler and safer for more people. But there has been an increase in <a href="http://ndic.gov.ng/ndic-releases-2015-annual-report/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fraud</a> in the banking and payment systems. These crimes are carried out using the information and communications technology that has flourished in Nigeria since the early 2000s.
A <a href="http://ndic.gov.ng/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/NDIC%20Report%202013.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">2013 report</a> by the Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation identified 14 types of electronic fraud (e-fraud). Automated teller machine (ATM) fraud was in prime position. It accounted for just under 10% of the total value of funds lost to e-fraud and 46.3% of the reported number of cases. The agency’s <a href="http://ndic.gov.ng/ndic-releases-2015-annual-report/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">2015 report</a> points to an increase in the incidence of ATM fraud in Nigeria.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/entreprenuers/2017/09/01/watchdog-sniffing-deception/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Watchdog Sniffing Out Deception</a>
Despite the apparent importance of e-fraud, little scholarly attention has been paid to understanding how it affects the functioning of the financial system and its impact on victims. That’s why my colleagues and I carried out a <a href="http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/hsp/jpss/2017/00000011/00000001/art00011" target="_blank" rel="noopener">study</a> to examine the experiences of ATM fraud victims in south-west Nigeria. We focused on what made a person more likely to be a victim and on the fraudsters’ tactics.
<h2>Study results</h2>
We found that a number of factors predisposed people to being victims of fraud. These include illiteracy, health problems and issues of vulnerability.
An elderly illiterate man who was interviewed said:
<blockquote>I was given an ATM card and nobody told me how to use it. Outside the bank I gave it to a young man at the ATM to help me withdraw cash. He did it and returned my card to me. After a few days I noticed money had left my account, which I promptly reported to my bank. At the bank I was told that the young man had swapped my card.</blockquote>
Our study also showed that close family members sometimes exploit people’s trust to defraud them. One middle-aged man gave his son his ATM card to draw N5,000 ($31.25) ahead of returning to school. He later discovered that his son had instead drawn N10,000 ($62.50). “If my son could do that to me while I was trying to help him, who can one trust?” he lamented.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/entreprenuers/2017/06/01/im-like-person-walked-house-got-mugged/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">&#8216;I&#8217;m Like A Person Who Walked Out Of My House And Got Mugged&#8217;</a>
When people are ill, they can be vulnerable to ATM fraud. They depend on others because they can’t get around. A “trusted” person may take advantage.
The story of a young man interviewed during our study helps illustrate this. He was ill and gave his ATM card to a friend to help him buy medication. He was later “shocked” to discover that his friend had drawn an extra N70,000 ($237.50) from his account.
<h2>The coercion factor</h2>
Of course, friends and relatives are not to blame for all ATM frauds. Some occur through coercion, particularly physical attacks and armed robbery at <a href="https://www.vanguardngr.com/2017/02/police-arrest-atm-robbery-suspect-lagos/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ATMs</a>.
One young woman told us:
<blockquote>I wanted to make a withdrawal on a Sunday evening. The ATM on my street was not working so I had to look for another ATM a few streets away. Unfortunately I was robbed by an armed gang. They made me insert my ATM card to confirm the PIN number and balance. They went away with my ATM card and PIN. I couldn’t do anything until Monday, by which time my account had been drained of N200,000 ($1,250). They took my phone so I could not even alert the bank and block withdrawals.</blockquote>
The success of online fraud depends on offenders choosing easy victims.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2015/09/01/con-me-if-you-can/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Con Me If You Can</a>
<h2>Stemming the tide</h2>
Reducing ATM fraud depends on making people less vulnerable.
For example, anti-fraud education campaigns must use indigenous languages and consider that some bank customers can’t read. Banks must show their customers how their cards work and how to get help when in trouble. Security officers who are not bank staff should not be allowed to deal with customers.
ATM users should be taught to change their passwords sometimes. They must also be cautious about when and where they withdraw money to reduce the risk of attacks. &#8211; Written by <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/oludayo-tade-244002" target="_blank" rel="author noopener">Oludayo Tade</a>, Lecturer of Criminology, Victimology, Deviance and Social Problems, University of Ibadan
Originally published in <a href="https://theconversation.com/africa" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>
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How Nigerian ATM fraud victims are swindled

This zinc enclosure, hidden between two shacks in a South African township, is a hot little corner of hell. The dog inside, a powerful pit bull, cowers as the door is broken open and the torches of the raid team shine on him. He’s one of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of dogs kept in hiding, chained and neglected, to serve an explosion of dog fighting across the country.
It’s a crime which occurs far from middle-class homes and businesses – yet it serves as both an indicator and predictor of crime that looms over them. Where dog fighting flourishes, drugs, gambling, organized crime, thievery, assault and murder march in lockstep.
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“Dog fighters are violent criminals that engage in a whole host of peripheral criminal activities. Many are heavily involved in organized crime, racketeering, drug distribution, or gangs, and they arrange and attend the fights as a forum for gambling and drug trafficking,” wrote Hannah Gibson, in a study published by the College of Law of Michigan State University in 2005.
But why has this crime taken off in South Africa?
Twenty years ago, in a Gauteng study of complaints registered at major branches of the SPCA (the local arm of the animal welfare organization NSPCA), dog fighting didn’t even feature, says Wendy Willson, Manager of NSPCA’s Special Investigations Unit – there was just one report where two dogs jumped their walls and mixed it up. But “in the 2014-2015 statistics, there were over 1,290 reports of dog fighting to the NSPCA.”
These ballooning stats are just the tip of the iceberg; dog fighting has almost no recognition among the public and police in South Africa. Most people have no idea that it is a crime and police have been known to laugh in disbelief when animal welfare organizations report incidents.
The same applies to the rest of Africa. Dog fighting as a crime is almost unheard of, although it has leaked out into surrounding Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries, such as Namibia, to a limited extent. But the SPCA in Kenya, for example, says there is no dog fighting there, while Uganda’s SPCA “suspected but could not confirm” some isolated incidents.
However, Amina Abaza, Chair of the Society for the Protection of Animal Rights in Egypt (SPARE), says dog fighting is an issue in Egypt.
“It is becoming more and more popular, especially in the lower class of the society,” she says.
In Egypt, it’s not yet against the law and videos of fights are often posted online. People import dogs from Eastern Europe.
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“Each litter will bring them money,” says Abaza.
“It’s a symptom of an economic time and of a defiant and desperate youth,” says Willson.
Dog fighting occurs worldwide, especially where young men have little prospects and feel emasculated, as shown in a 2008 study of dog fighting among low-income youth in London. But, in South Africa, it has an added layer of ferocity and is largely driven by bloodlust, says Willson.
It’s a perfect vicious circle: exposure to dog fighting at a young age reduces empathy. Older boys and young men maintain the circle by inducting a new generation of children into this secretive world.
In Duduza, a township east of Johannesburg, the NSPCA were approached by a school concerned at the behavior of about 20 pupils, who were mimicking dog fights in the playground – biting, growling and attacking each other, and even playing out the mating of dogs. These boys, aged between nine and 13, had been introduced to dog fighting by an older boy or man whom they looked up to. School records show behavior changes over six months: “Elevated aggression levels, bullying and violent outbursts,” says Willson, noting that one child attacked his teacher with a six-inch nail.
In the hyper-stimulating and ‘fraternal’ atmosphere of a dog fight, these boys are exposed to unbelievable brutality. It is an introduction to a network of criminality that drives an inability to understand another’s pain and fear. Often violence becomes part of the thrill.
Fortunately, the criminal justice system and communities are beginning to take this issue seriously. In 1995, an early dog fighting bust netted several people who were fined (the wider group all chipped in to pay the fines). Today, dog fighters go to jail.
The NSPCA Special Investigations Unit gathers evidence patiently, over many months, and keeps the identities of informants safe, to construct a strong case in court. They’ve developed an ability to forensically examine dog carcasses and bones and determine what kind of fighting the dog has been forced into from the lesions on the bones.
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“It’s important that communities, especially parents, understand [that] when their children get involved in dog fighting, they risk criminal records – which means they’ll probably never work,” says Cora Bailey of Community Led Animal Welfare (CLAW), an organization that is trying to educate people on the dangers of dog fighting in townships west of Johannesburg.
“Communities know how dangerous dog fighting is, to them and their children,” says Bailey. “They don’t want this going on next door. They know it ups the violence quotient considerably.”
The violence of dog fighting is not only felt by the dogs, the community is also being hurt, despite being unaware that a cruel blood sport is becoming rampant near their homes.

The Criminal World Of Dog Eat Dog

Cape Town’s townships were once referred to as “apartheid’s dumping ground”. Today, 22 years into democracy, the stories usually told of these spaces speak of poverty, rampant crime and socioeconomic marginalization.
But Tony Elvin, the charismatic founder of Ikhaya Le Langa, has a very different view. “When I first discovered Langa, not only was it not what I was told in terms of supposedly being a sad and fearful place,” he says, “It was the place where I found a community still intact. There’s an energy and a spirit that is in Langa, and if we can capture that, it’s like gold.”
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Seated in the café at his headquarters in a repurposed Langa primary school, Elvin uses a detailed and dog-eared map of Cape Town to introduce what his NGO is trying to achieve in Cape Town’s oldest black township.
What the map reveals is surprising and powerful: Langa does not sit on the isolated peripheries of the metropolis where common lore has long positioned it, but right at its pulsing heart.
As a black Londoner living in Langa, Elvin admits that he’s used to surprising people. Before he moved here permanently in 2010, the long-neglected Langa community’s interaction with the rest of the world had been limited to occasional groups of white tourists passing through on a quick “poverty safari”, as Tony disdainfully calls the archetypal township tour, before heading back to their cushy city hotels.
Through the ongoing development of the so-called Langa Quarter, Elvin hopes to emphatically change that trend.
“The aim is to create an aspirational cool place, not just for tourists, to create a new place in Cape Town where Capetonians can also go, not only for a history lesson, but to listen to some great jazz, see some great art, chill out and have a great time. I want the Langa Quarter to be to Cape Town what the French Quarter is to New Orleans,” says Elvin.
The Langa Quarter is the pilot model of a concept that Elvin has dubbed the “Social Enterprise Precinct”. The idea, he says, is to overlay the social enterprise principles of “people, planet and profit” onto particular neighborhoods, and to thereby create “viable, sustainable spaces where investment will flourish, and the poverty will then take care of itself.”
Elvin has considerable experience doing this in Cape Town, having first come here as a social enterprise consultant for celebrity chef Jamie Oliver in 2004. Elvin soon fell in love with the city and went on to set up his own social enterprise consultancy firm in the center of Cape Town, where he came into contact with a number of young township-based social entrepreneurs.
“I became aware that there was a lot more I wanted to do in Cape Town, and particularly in the townships,” says Elvin.
He concedes that he still “wasn’t quite sure” what he was setting out to achieve when he moved from his luxurious Hout Bay residence into the township to start Ikhaya Le Langa.
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“Even today, I sometimes describe it all as being at sea, in the middle of a storm, in a boat that I’m still building, without knowing what shape it will take, and I’m not sure what direction I’m headed in either. It’s still new, this approach.”
But Elvin can already boast a number of successes, including the Langa Quarter Homestay Hotel, where visitors are fed and accommodated in the home of a Langa resident. Since its inception a little over a year ago, this initiative has contributed more than R100,000 (roughly $6,400) to the 15 households currently involved – a considerable amount of money in an area where the majority earn less than R4,000 (roughly $250) a month.
Then there’s the annual, and increasingly well-attended, Uplifting Langa Through Reachable Art (ULTRA) street art event, which this year drew talented artists from across the Langa community and far beyond; world-renowned French street artist Jace stayed in Langa for a week as the event’s artist in residence.
Other fledgling ventures – including a media, graphics and advertising studio, an online shop for local artisans and designers, and a new restaurant – have drawn support from multinational companies, including Amazon and Ikea.
But take a walk with Elvin through the intricate crisscrossing streets of the quarter and it’s evident that he’s not resting on his laurels. He talks incessantly, throwing out countless ideas and plans for improving everything that he passes.
The effusive greetings he receives from the local residents along the way pay testament to the time he has invested in gaining their trust, and ensuring that they will be a central part of every step of this process.
“Above all, I’m focused on how the wonderful, cool transformation of Langa can positively influence the community and what is the opportunity to drive change. Langa deserves to be shown some love.”
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It’s also clear that Elvin feels more than just a philanthropic affinity for Langa.
“I love living in Langa. I’ve got friends here, I love the noise of Langa, I like the people that you walk around and see every day – it’s really very charming. After six years, Langa’s my home.”
With so much still in the pipeline, Elvin is not looking to uproot himself anytime soon.
“The Langa Quarter is far from a finished product, but we are at a stage where we can invite people in and, critically, they can stay,” he says. “So that’s a stake in the ground and we will grow from that, and more and more people will benefit from that. Essentially what we’ve done already is create hope.”

The Londoner Capturing African Spirit And Spinning It Into Gold

It was nine days of hell that Ray Choto will never forget. Live electric wires were pushed into his genitals; it was so excruciating that he snapped the chain of his handcuffs. With his editor, Mark Chavunduka, he was stripped and blindfolded at a military base in Cranborne, a suburb of Harare. Their captors shoved their heads in drums of water. They were forced to do push-ups in the rain, in between beatings, and afterwards their torturers kicked them through the wet grass to clean off the blood.
It all began because of a news story the now late Chavunduka, founding editor of The Standard, Zimbabwe’s independent Sunday newspaper, and Choto, the newspaper’s former chief investigative reporter, wrote in January, 1999 that 23 soldiers, including seven officers, were under arrest for inciting their comrades to overthrow president Robert Mugabe. The authorities wanted to know who leaked the story. The two young African men suffered at the hands of their own people but never revealed their sources.
“As a journalist, my responsibility is to protect my sources. Even if it meant that I was going to be thrown into jail or killed. I was ready for it in defense of ethical journalism,” says Choto, 15 years on.
“The torture was very barbaric. I was handcuffed, put in leg irons, and tortured by way of electric shocks all over my body. They also hit me with wooden planks, clenched fists &#8230;”
Their crime? According to Choto, it was allegedly contravening a section of the Law and Order Maintenance Act. They challenged the constitutional validity of the controversial colonial law and the Zimbabwe Supreme Court declared the provision null and void and the case fell away.
Both were flown to London for psychological and physical treatment. In May 2000, Choto received further treatment in Australia.
Contrary to reports that he fled Zimbabwe, Choto explains that he went to the United States (US) on September 6, 2000 to take up the prestigious John S. Knight Fellowship for professional journalists at Stanford University in California. It was during his first year at the university that Mugabe’s government introduced strict laws that made it difficult for journalists to work.
The program appointed Choto as a senior fellow, extending his stay in the US for another year. This came at a time when Zimbabwe’s government news publications labeled Choto an enemy of the state. He cites an article that detailed a press conference, held by the military and the police, in which they warned the independent media that they were ready to treat those that write negatively about Zimbabwe the same way they treated Choto and Chavunduka.
Choto went home on the first of day of 2002 and planned to be in Zimbabwe for eight days. A senior source in the military agreed to secretly meet him at a hotel in Harare. Choto had called him to tell him that he was in the country and asked if he had time to meet for a drink. The military source sounded hesitant, but agreed. They communicated in code in case the phone was bugged. When they met, the military source asked Choto why he came back in dangerous times and told him to leave the country.
Choto got on a plane and left. He then telephoned family and friends to ask whether he should return. All, including his mother, said no. Choto, now 13 years in the US, says he will not go home as long as the ruling party, Zanu-PF, is in power.
“The loss of my mother in May 2010 was, and remains, a thorn in my heart. Unfortunately, I couldn’t go to Zimbabwe to see her laid to rest.”
Now a senior editor at the Voice of America (VOA) in the Africa Division in Washington D.C., Choto says that it is challenging to work on stories from a distance.
As Mugabe begins his seventh term, Choto clings on to hope.
“The solution lies in the hands of the people of Africa. They have to elect democratic leaders and reject undemocratic leaders who come to power through chicanery.”
You have to listen to a man who shed blood for his beliefs.   FL

Tag: Crime

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