Pretoria - The Tshwane Community Safety Department is satisfied with operations during the three FIFA Confederations Cup matches held at the Loftus Versveld Stadium.
"The department is satisfied with all the operations. We will endeavor to make more improvements to what is clearly a winning formula," department executive director, Commissioner Mpho Mmutle, said on Tuesday.
Commissioner Mmutle said the city had successfully hosted the three soccer matches, with no major incident reported.
Throughout the tournament, the Metro Police deployed members for high visibility, patrols and information management.
The second major intervention was in the area of traffic management. "We can report that the street closures worked very well. At all times Metro Police manned the street closures and ensured that the stadium precinct was a traffic-free zone," Commissioner Mmutle said.
Regarding the park-and-ride arrangement, he said no incident was reported at either the traffic closures or the park-and-ride facilities.
"Nor did we experience any traffic congestion, even for the fully subscribed Brazil/Italy match. We made an operational adjustment by introducing the fourth park-and-ride due to high volumes of cars and fans," he said.
However, he did note some concerns regarding the park-and-ride arrangement which included illegal parking attendants directing fans outside the designated parking areas.
"We wish to warn fans that following illegal parking attendants by parking outside the designated parking areas is not safe," he said.
The major challenge, he said, was the illegal selling of flags at intersections and park-and-ride facilities.
"Most of the goods that were confiscated were non-perishables. In terms of quantity, 5 380 items, which include flags, vuvuzelas, toys, lights, cigarettes, caps, hats, and other goods were either seized or found abandoned," Commissioner Mmutle said.
He said they will request a debriefing session with the South African Police Services and the Local Organising Committee security unit to share their experiences, challenges, and make proposals on how to perfect our operations for the 2010 tournament.
"We will be exploring all avenues to enable the department to enhance the technical capacity of members," Commissioner Mmutle said.
The department further thanked the residents of Tshwane, soccer fans, and the media for assisting them to communicate critical messages to the public.
