Community policing forums in the Western Cape on Thursday said that police had to step up their efforts to curb a rapid rise in gang activity.
The lowering of the lockdown to level 3 meant more freedom to move.
That, coupled with the apparent ending of a pre-lockdown truce between gangsters, saw a sudden rapid increase in violent incidents.
Fransina Lukas from the Western Cape community policing forum board said that thousands of people found themselves stuck between two equally deadly forces – a virus they could not see and gangsters who struck from the shadows.
“As a community in the Cape Flats, we cannot afford to deal with the pandemic that is killing our people and on the other hand gang violence that has resulted in deaths too,” Lukas said.
Lukas said that residents were doing what they could to curb the spread of the virus, but when it came to stopping gang war in its tracks, they had to rely on the police.
“The anti-gang unit should be going into these areas and using their intelligence that is there to deal with these shootings in our communities,” she said.
On Wednesday evening, Moegamat Johnson and his two-year-old son, Zhario, were walking down the street in Bonteheuwel when gangsters drove by and opened fire.
Johnson died on the scene and his little boy died later in hospital.
Earlier this week, another family – including two children – were shot inside their wendy house in Lentegeur.
Police said they were still investigating both cases and were yet to make arrests.