Johannesburg — DESPITE crime levels in SA remaining high, as shown in the crime statistics released yesterday, the South African Police Service (SAPS) believed it had played a major role in the general reduction of crime in the past five years.

The service also believed it was well placed to implement plans that would further reduce crime in SA.

The SAPS said the decrease in major categories of crime was the result of interventions aimed at improving the competence of police, increasing the number of police personnel, establishing partnerships with communities and business, increasing intelligence gathering operations and internal restructuring.

Crime statistics for the year to March showed a decrease in six of the eight crime categories against the person but increases in murder and aggravated robbery such as car hijacking, bank robbery, cash-in-transit heists and robbery at business premises.

Rape, common assault, attempted murder and common robbery all showed a slight decrease.

Bank robberies increased by 70 cases from 59 cases in 2005- 06 to 129 cases in 2006 -07 and cash-in-transit robberies by 84 cases from 383 to 467.

Robberies at residential premises increased from 10173 to 12761, robberies at business premises increased from 4387 to 6689, while burglaries at residential premises decreased from 262535 to 249665.

Deputy police commissioner Mala Singh said there had been a general downward trend in the number of crimes over the past five years as a result of several interventions by the SAPS.

She said the SAPS had increased its personnel by 50000 in the past five years, and had also retained skills and revitalised its training.

Singh said the deployment in February of 15000 police working as provincial, national and area level support staff to police stations had also contributed to reducing crime.

Singh said the SAPS had also empowered station commissioners to take critical and immediate operational decisions without approval from head office.

Deputy police commissioner Andre Pruis said that over the past four years police had worked with communities to combat crime. He said sector policing, which entailed dividing a station into smaller clusters and establishing partnerships with the communities, had worked well.

In the 169 police stations that had been identified as priority stations - where the majority of social contact crimes had been reported - 942 sectors had been established, 76% of which were fully operational.

Pruis said there was no cure-all formula for all areas and police were focusing on crime types per station.

The SAPS had also grouped a number of stations into clusters to ensure that crime would not migrate to other policing areas.

He said the service had recruited 35000 reservists for combating crime. The target was 100000 reservists by 2009.

The SAPS had also profiled areas where most criminal activity took place. These areas included shebeens and informal settlements.

Furthermore, the SAPS had invested heavily in technology in order to improve its various levels of intelligence.

Pruis said the service had started buying aircraft with cameras to assist in combating crime.

Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said police would in October launch a new radio communications system, which would also be able to trace the location of police vehicles.

Nqakula said the new technology would enable police to trace calls for help made from landlines or cellphones, and also establish the caller's location.

Police commissioner Jackie Selebi said Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and Western Cape accounted for 63% of the serious crimes committed in the country.

"We must win the war against crime in Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and Western Cape.

"In whatever we do in terms of resources, these three provinces must have advantage over all other provinces," Selebi said .

Nqakula said investments made in people and resources would ensure there were changes to policing, which would result in the reduction of crime.

He said partnerships with communities were important in the fight against crime because the members of those communities were repositories of intelligence that would prove useful to the police.