WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.
Original Post Date: 2008-04-27 Time: 00:00:00 Posted By: Jan
‘The first thing I tell the guys when they join up is ‘complacency equals death’,” says Captain Kyle Thompson, standing on the parade ground of a South African Police training centre. “You can die out there.”
Thompson, a police reservist, recalls venting his anger in front of police officers who were called to his father’s home after a robbery. “They told me, why don’t you do something about it,” says Thompson.
He joined the reservists and 20 years later is head of the reservists at Johannesburg’s Jeppe police station and a training officer at the training centre in Houghton.
The centre is a north-facing, double-gabled Cape Dutch house like others in the neighbourhood – but where other Houghton Drive homes have rolling lawns and rose gardens, the academy has a flat stretch of tar, two flagstaffs and platoons of reservists standing in rows.
The eloquently, abusive Inspector Devlin Phillips prowls past the motley mix of volunteers, barking drill commands.
“Move on the ‘one’, dammit!” The wide-eyed student constables stare straight ahead. They’re of every gender, race and size.
“And a-one, two, three, halt!”
The two platoons stamp the ground in discord. “You sound like a bunch of cows dumping on a wet road!” he blusters. “Get outta my face!”
The students stampede for the far side of the parade ground, then past the house, before they line up again. Thompson looks on.
“How many today?” asks Superintendent Heidi Dembsky from the podium. Dembsky is a forty-something woman with short, blonde hair. She is frenetic and abrupt; some trainers call her Mom.
“Don’t piss her off,” warns Thompson. “She’ll skin you alive.”
The call is “five short!” Dembsky identifies them from her paperwork and the cadets move to lecture rooms for theoretical training and tests.
Superintendent Nick Cinquina and Dembsky have run the training centre since 1982. He’s done 18 years, Dembsky 20. “Nobody gets remuneration,” says Cinquina. “Neither I as a training reservist nor any other reservist is paid for our work.” Volunteers are motivated to “do something about crime”.
“We get some guys who think they can be Starsky and Hutch,” says Cinquina, “but they soon learn policing is 90 percent paperwork and 10 percent action.”
The sound of volunteers in marching boots is music to the ears of the ministry of safety and security who in 2006 declared that it would spend R260 million to enlist about 50 000 reservists before 2009 in anticipation of the security requirements for the 2010 World Cup. This modular outcomes-based course is to qualify D-class reservists or sector policemen. They will perform duties under the command of A-category reservists.
Everyone has a story about what prompted them to join up.
Given Maila’s father Simon was a distributor of milk and meat. He was hijacked in 1996. “They had him kneeling down in the bush and were arguing about who was going to shoot him. Eventually they just ran off. From that day there was no more business,” says Maila. “Now he’s [at] home, unemployed.
“My reason is not to avenge, but to make sure it doesn’t happen to the next person.”
Rose from Rosettenville (she did not want to be indentified) joined the reservists because she is afraid her next experience of crime will be her last. “Two men. They took everything. The second time, three men surrounded me and took me to that place that used to be for homeless people. I was fighting but nobody was helping. And then they raped me. I know the next time they are going to kill me, so I must know how to protect myself.”
“Fall in!” bawls Thompson.
Students scamper into lines and Phillips moves through the ranks.
“Straighten up this front line! Don’t smile at me!” he zeros in. “I’m not your friend. I’m not good-looking, and I’m certainly not that way inclined!”
On the shooting range Tumisho Matlala prepares by doing press-ups with someone lying on top of him. “I dig swimming pools,” says the beefy Matlala.
The officers describe characters like Matlala as paraat – disciplined, determined and proud. “I think it comes from home,” says Thompson.
“When you do the right thing, people hate you because they think you’re a clever,” says Matlala. “Even my friends! They’ve started to hate me. My life since I’ve joined this course has changed. They think I’m a spy, or a ‘number one’. As long as you are in South Africa, if you are in the police, you are number one enemy,” Matlala says. “But I must enforce justice.”
Dembsky and Cinquina are doing the paperwork – circling holes in targets with red ink and totalling scores while the trainers are supervising shooting.
“Sure this is right?” asks Dembsky, looking at a blank target. “Yip!” responds the range officer.
Craig Ramsden scores 100 percent – 45 bullets in a cluster the size of a fist. He is a horse dentist from Chartwell. “It’s a mess there,” he says. “Three armed guys walked into a Christmas party in my neighbourhood, opened fire, killing three.
“If people sit behind walls and squeak, nothing will be done. Don’t just squeak,” he says. “Work in the station, do neighbourhood watch or make a donation.”
Summer is passing, the days are shorter, three months have gone. It’s dark on the parade ground except for the light from two small spotlights. Preparations are underway for the passing-out parade.
“We’re going to get hard on you now,” says Thompson. “We’ve got to be prepared for Saturday.”
The drilling begins and Thompson offers encouragement.
“It’s been a long haul,” says 39-year-old Marcus Maphopha. “We’ve been looking forward to it ending. We leave here late at night and we have to wake up early for work. We also read and study.
“Altogether there are 16 of us from Linden. Most of us did not know each other before the course, but now after 12 weeks we’re like brothers,” he says.
Law, rules and procedures have been central to training but drilling has developed discipline and pride in the group. It’s been an opportunity to bond.
In the centre, Dembsky thumps a pile of khaki files on the table. “Who folded these?” she scowls.
Cinquina is totalling marks. “Rautenbach,” he says without looking up. “97 percent.”
“Who?” Dembsky snaps, narrowing her eyes.
“Rautenbach. Best student constable,” repeats Cinquina dispassionately.
Outside the two platoons are rigid, practising “how to stand for a long time”. A relaxed Thompson and Phillips banter on the side.
“I wonder who’s going down?” ponders Thompson. “My money’s on our navy seal,” chortles Phillips, swinging his boot.
“What about Muti Man?” responds Thompson.
They laugh about the unfortunate student who believed a muti charm would protect his eyes from pepper spray. The students are expressionless behind them.
“Right, let’s do this quickly,” says Thompson, tossing his cigarette and heading for the podium.
“Remember,” he stresses in a loud voice, “stand still, no looking around. If you come up here, be calm, take your time, don’t trip. If anybody does trip, I want no laughing. People, do not laugh.”
Saturday 2pm: the ranks are marching along Houghton Drive into the training centre preceded by the national flag and that of the South African Police Service (SAPS).
“A-left, right, a-left, right,” calls out Phillips.
A police siren wails to clear away family and friends who are clustered around the entrance, snapping pictures. Cinquina stands in parade uniform on the podium, his blue gloves holding a microphone. Senior officers of the SAPS reservists are seated in lines behind him.
Drill and inspection of the parade goes smoothly and Superintendent Harold Machile, a training officer from provincial training, has been invited to address the students. He rises from his seat among the top brass. “If there are six policemen,” he begins, “and one get’s shot, how many will be left? He pauses, looking at 156 faces, motionless, wide eyed and staring blankly ahead.
“One. The rest run away,” he continues.
The normally stiff-lipped Dembsky begins to snigger. Thompson watches the ranks like a hawk.