JMPD recalls 1000 officers due to ‘lack of skills’
More than a 1000 newly trained Johannesburg metro police officers had to be taken off the streets and sent back to training.
Metro police spokesperson Wayne Minnaar says a decision was made to recall the officers from the field in February due to a lack of skills.
According to reports, some of the recalled offices cannot drive or know how to use their weapons, while others had a phobia for getting on the road to control traffic.
“Training will now be based on individual needs, which will include firearm training, K78 roadblocks, incident and accident management and how to manage breathalyser and speeding equipment,” says Minnaar.
Minnaar says the duration of the training will be determined by the head of the Metropolitan Police Academy.
Listen to Minnaar below:
The recalled officers were recruited in 2018 and underwent a crawling 18-month training programme at the academy determined by The Road Traffic Management Control (RTMC).
RTMC’s spokesperson Simon Zwane says organisation evaluated the training and identified gaps that JMPD must address for the officers to be “fully qualified”.
“So, we have given them all the information that needs to be addressed; they need to attend to that then we will go and evaluate how far they have gone. When all of them have been satisfied [technical requirements] they will get the green light,” says Zwane.
Listen to Zwane below: