The charismatic Colonel Kweyama, new Hillcrest SAPS station commander, is a man with a mission, writes James Siddall.
When I first met Colonel Nathaniel Kweyama, he came across as everyone’s favourite uncle.
He smiles easily and has an affability which, after 21 years of interviewing people, I sense is genuine, as opposed to the ersatz variety – sometimes turned on for the benefit of the media and then extinguished quickly.
Indeed, you could easily imagine having the colonel around for a Sunday afternoon braai, and discussing kids, schools and, of course, crime concerns with him.
But beneath the easy-going exterior lies a dedicated career policeman with a core of titanium, and his posting to Hillcrest SAPS as its new commander is the community’s gain – and criminals’ loss.
Going back a bit, Colonel Kweyama went straight from school into the SAP in 1979. For him, it was never just a job. “Initially, I wanted to be a fireman,” he smiles. “I had this passion for helping people in difficulty, and I think I will die with that passion.”
Most of his career has been spent as a detective, and from 2001 to 2005 he was station commander at Ndwedwe. At one stage he was also head of detective services at Durban Central, which he describes and a “huge station”, and was acting station commander there. So this is hardly the first time he’s felt the weight and responsibility of command.
Right now, he lives in Wyebank, while his three children are, variously, at school, a trainee retail manager, and a policeman. Colonel Kweyama doesn’t have much time for domestic bliss or recreation, although he admits to being an avid AmaZulu supporter, and has been since 1972, although he admits that leisure reading helps him unwind.
“I’ve been in the force for more than 31 years and I spend 95% of my waking hours doing police work,” he says.
Community involvement
Police work is patently something very close to the colonel’s heart, and just one facet in which he sees room for improvement is community involvement and commitment.
“People often don’t even know their neighbours, you know, and I’d want a very strong Community Policing Forum (CPF) with a lot of neighbourly co-operation, which is very important,” he says, adding that it’s essential, for a start, to have your neighbours’ cellphone numbers and to foster a sense of community.
“The area we serve is very vast and I would want to see a situation where we take the service to the people by reviving previous satellite stations in places like Molweni and Shongweni. It’s a matter of tapping into the funds and the business community.”
One area of crime he finds particularly troubling in Hillcrest is housebreaking, as well as “trio crime” – house robbery, hijacking and business crime – which is something far too many readers will have encountered.
Just part of the problem, as he sees it, is a lack of community feedback. “In the past, we would get calls from people if they saw something suspicious or if they saw people loitering, but that’s not really the case anymore,” says the colonel. “Our core business, as police, is to prevent crime and not to just be reactive.
“People must be like chameleons: when they walk down the road, they must look all around them…”