The City Manager, Dr. Imogen Mashazi honoured female metro police officers and emergency personnel at Tsakane, Ekhaya Shopping Centre where only female officers held a roadblock at 09:00.
This operation forms part of the City Manager’s Women in Uniform Legacy Project which was launched in 2017 for women who have gone beyond the call of duty to serve the people of the region. The project was launched to empower female officers, firefighters and disaster management officers through career progression and education.
To date, more than 700 females have benefitted from the project through promotion, recruitment and furthering their studies. “When I started with the City of Ekurhuleni I found the two departments which are the Department of Disaster Management and the Metro Police dominated by men, even in the SAPS, most positions are occupied by males so I decided to recruit more females. In the process of recruiting these females, I also organised internal bursaries and programmes to uplift their standards in order for them to take any challenge in terms of new positions should senior ranks or positions be vacant in the department. I’m glad that we have so many females appointed today in the police department,” added the City Manager.
The City Manager also mentioned the enormous change she had made for females ever since she was appointed as a City Manager in 2017. She further disclosed that she’s empowering women not only to be great but to also take up space and acknowledge that women are just as able as the male counterparts. She expressed how proudly she is with the successful results of the initiative since its inception in the past four years. “I’m quite excited that today we have female Constables, Inspectors, Deputy Directors, Superintendents, Chief Superintendents and Directors. I hope we have a female Chief Police in future but nonetheless, our women have levelled up since I served as the City Manager. There are statistics on how many women have been promoted and I will be giving awards to these women on the 31st of August 2021,” expressed Mashazi.
As it is Women’s month, Dr. Mashazi also advised women to stay strong, be decisive and never give up. “The sky is the limit. No one believed that someday a woman would be a City Manager but here I am, the very first female in Ekurhuleni to occupy this position. Study, outperform, achieve your target, comply with the law and always remember that anything is possible,” concluded the City Manager.
By Palesa Ndinisa and Zoleka Batsha
