Ormonde residents laud G20’s positive impact with police visibility


Residents of Ormonde, south of Johannesburg, say the now-ended G20 Leaders’ Summit has had a positive impact on their community, despite disruptions caused by road closures.

Ormonde is located next to the Nasrec Expo Centre, the venue for the summit. Residents have appreciated the increased police visibility, rapid infrastructure upgrades and cleaner streets.

Residents wish this level of service delivery could continue beyond the summit.

“People got opportunities here. We watched people from our community cleaning every day, making sure it was clean. I hope it’s going to bring some changes to the youth and create more opportunities for us to grow as humans. They fixed some of the robots that weren’t working. More should be invested in our infrastructure even outside of the G20,” says a resident.

Deputy National Police Commissioner, Tebello Mosikili, has refuted claims that law enforcement is heightened and visible only during mega events such as the G20 Leaders’ Summit that just ended in Johannesburg.

Responding to questions from SABC News on the sidelines of the summit at the Nasrec Expo Centre, Mosikili says, “It is just unfortunate, as I indicated even yesterday, Operation Shanela, not only in Gauteng but all over the country, continued to protest. We continue to do policing in the country, not only when there are events, but people need to look at and measure the magnitude of the events we have. This includes soccer matches; we have been policing them. We pull resources that we think we need to pull and place members on duty for that particular event, not forgetting other areas.”

VIDEO | G20 Summit | Views of residents, businesses around Nasrec

– Story by Khensani Chauke