Strict enforcement of South Africa's coronavirus lockdown by police and the army has placed the spotlight on official brutality, a cause of anger among the majority Black population for decades.
But a strict coronavirus lockdown and a ban on selling alcohol have thrust the issue into the spotlight, with human rights groups accusing police and the army of using excessive force in low-income areas.More than 100 people have reported beatings, verbal abuse, torture and humiliation to the online violence tracker since it launched in April, 80% of them from low-income areas.
"Our hope is to get a large pool of data together to highlight behaviour patterns," said Nathanial Roloff, director of Safety Lab, which implements projects to mitigate violent crime and helped build the tracker website. "Attempts to report police in the past have been met with silence or long processes, rarely with justice," said Roloff.
In June, protesters gathered in different South African cities carrying placards with the names of George Floyd, a Black American man who died in police custody, and Collins Khosa, a South African who died in a Johannesburg township on April 10.
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