Urgent steps are being considered around the Signal Hill road and parking lot after a young Norwegian student was raped.
|||Cape Town - Urgent steps are being considered around the Signal Hill road and parking lot after a Norwegian exchange student and a friend were robbed there and the student was raped.
At about 1am on Saturday the student, 19, and a friend, a South African man, were robbed in the parking lot and forced back into their car by the attackers.
Police spokesman Andre Traut said the man was tied up before the attackers drove away with them.
On the way, the attackers took turns raping the exchange student. When they arrived in Summergreens, Milnerton, the attackers ran away.
Traut said no arrests had been made.
The Signal Hill road and parking lot are patrolled by the police, the metro police and the Table Mountain National Park’s guards.
The mayco member for safety and security, JP Smith, said various safety aspects would be studied after the attack.
The CCTV camera at the main parking area on the hill could not capture activity at night. There were also many more smaller view sites along the scenic road - and cameras could not be positioned at each of these.
The Table Mountain Safety Forum would discuss whether and how to increase patrols at all these sites, or whether some should be closed during certain hours.
Smith said while Capetonians knew that parking at remote view sites late at night was inadvisable, tourists might not, and ways had to be found to communicate this information to visitors.
A formal request would have to be made to the city if the road was to be closed at night.
Andre van Schalkwyk, spokesman for Table Mountain Watch, accused the city of downplaying crime to tourists. He said on Tuesday that signage warning visitors of potential crime hotspots was necessary.
In the brief period that Signal Hill was closed off with a boom after 10pm, there was a noticeable decline in violent crimes.
But Cape Town Tourism chief executive Mariette du Toit-Helmbold said crime had become less of an issue for tourists over the past few years.
“This incident comes after a period in which we have noticed increased confidence in Cape Town as a safe destination.
“We are outraged by this incident.”
She said there was a range of reactive and proactive safety and support programmes available to visitors in the Mother City.
“It remains our duty as hosts to ensure that our visitors are protected and cared for.”
Cape Town Tourism, the police, the City and SANParks are due to meet today to discuss the attack as well as broader safety precautions in the city’s national parks and other tourism attractions.
murray.williams@inl.co.za and kieran.legg@inl.co.za
Cape Argus