SAPS honours top achievers
IT WAS passion for the job and a desire to serve that motivated the SAPS top achievers who were recognised for their efforts last night.
The SAPS KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Excellence Awards honoured some of the province’s top officers at an event held at the Coastlands Hotel in uMhlanga.
eThekwini Municipality had a strong presence at the awards. One of the winners was Chatsworth resident Captain Jayenthee Pillay who works at corporate communications, inner south. She won the woman of the year award.
Pillay said she was inspired to become a police officer by her older brother, Warrant Officer Richard Kisten. She said it was a calling for her. “I have been a police officer for 28 years and would not change it for anything.”
Pillay, who is part of the SAPS women’s network, said she worked hard in outreach programmes that created bridges between the youth and elderly and worked in interventions that helped to fight crime in Chatsworth. She said she believed that every person who went to a police station was someone who needed help.
A proud Pillay said this was the second time in a row that she had won the award, and she came second at last year’s national awards.
There awards include 22 categories with the winners receiving prizes of R10 000, second place R7 000 and third place R5 000. Others received gifts for their hard work.
Teamwork was a key part of the success of the officers who won. One such officer was Captain Keshni Schoeman of the Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences unit in Greytown, who won the FCS category.
The ecstatic Schoeman attributed the honour to her colleagues. “No one works in silos,” she said.
Schoeman, who has been with the police for 25 years, said it was the love of serving the community that attracted her to the job. She said she decided to join the FCS division in 2000 because she saw how vulnerable children were in society.
Working in the rural town of Greytown had taught the Phoenix-born woman many lessons. The biggest were that no two cases, or crime scenes, were the same and that one should be open-minded and value life.
Schoeman encouraged people to take up the 16 Days of Activism campaign and make it 365 days of activism against the abuse of women and children. Men were also abused and raped, she added.
What kept her going was the thanks she received from victims of abuse. Another motivation was criminals being put behind bars.
A police station which was honoured for putting many people behind bars was the Margate police station. It was crowned as the best in the province.
Station commissioner, Colonel Alan Grangier, said the success of the station was thanks to teamwork – every staff member had an important role to play. He said this contributed to the positive atmosphere at the station, as did the station commander, Brigadier William Slabbert, who led by example.
Grangier said the station’s detective unit was also honoured for making the most arrests – about 700 this year.