Durban — Security expert Johan Burger has called on police and its intelligence unit to up their game and find those responsible for a series of bomb threats in KwaZulu-Natal.
Burger’s call came as Durban residents were on a knife-edge following the third bomb threat in the space of a month forcing proceedings to come to an abrupt end on Tuesday morning after a massive evacuation at the Durban Magistrate’s Court.
Burger said this could be an act of terror to disrupt public services.
The police’s Explosives and K9 units evacuated everyone in the building after an unknown person phoned in a warning that a bomb that would explode at 10.30am.
The Durban High Court is housed in the same building and a few metres away from the provincial main police station.
Burger, a senior researcher at the Institute for Security Studies, said police cannot only always rush to scenes where bomb scares have been reported, but needed to find those behind the bomb threats to ensure that key institutions, like courts, were not disrupted.
“In such incidents we expect police to take over the security of the key institutions, but that would not be ideal since it will take police off the streets where they are supposed to be. This is why police intelligence must work harder to get to the bottom of the bomb scares,” said Burger.
He warned the state that one of the key strategies adopted by terrorists was intimidation and fear and that Tuesday’s action could have been meant to disrupt a particular case, he said.
It was interesting, he said, that one of the cases being heard was that of former eThekwini mayor, Zandile Gumede, saying although it was difficult to say with certainty that the incident was related to her case, it was suspicious.
A lawyer who is part of Gumede’s legal team, Paul Jorgensen, denied that the threat was related to the case, saying there have been more than 100 court appearances of the accused without any disturbance.
KZN National Prosecuting Authority spokesperson Natasha Ramkisson-Kara referred queries to the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development, saying courts belonged to the department.
Department of Justice spokesperson Tsekiso Machike said the department had set aside money for security upgrades at the building, adding that the cost of the project was being completed.
The incident came while police were still searching for the person/s who had dropped explosive devices at the Musjidur Rahman Mosque in Durban two weeks ago. Mosque officials said the suspects meant to bomb the property as they were seen planting them in shrubs within the premises.
Two days later, police had to go to Hillcrest High School after the school management received a telephone call warning about a bomb which was going to explode a few minutes later. The threat turned out to be a hoax.
In 2018 police arrested 19 men and charged them under the Terrorism Act after the Shi’a Mosque in Verulam was bombed. However, they were released two years later after the case was struck off the roll following unexplained delays by the State.
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