By Staff Writer
South Africans are saying no to crime one download at a time. Citizens are sick and tired of the violence and intimidation and have taken a stand armed with the one weapon that every person, young and old, can safely and effectively wield: technology.
Namola, South Africa’s innovative safety and security app is starting a personal safety movement, recently hitting 50 000 downloads – an impressive number of users – putting it at the top of the South African download charts in the app store.
We know that crime is rampant in our country. In 2016 alone 220,820 households were robbed, 250,606 homes were burgled, 14,602 cars were hijacked, and 51895 sexual offences were reported.
The severity of the impact of South Africa’s high crime rate on those living in low-income communities cannot be overestimated. With no access to infrastructure like transport, working street lights and private security, these communities are hardest hit by our country’s crime epidemic.
Citizens are justifiably scared and are concerned about the response times of emergency responders. That’s where Namola makes a difference.
Gauteng community safety MEC Sizakele Nkosi-Malobane said that “for some time there has been an outcry about response time in our communities” and that Namola would help to reduce this response time dramatically.
The Namola app is a unique solution to South Africa’s crime problem because it uses technology to put the power to create positive change in the hands of citizens.
This innovative thinking has already drawn accolades from around the world, including interest from Scotland Yard.
Namola was designed by Happimo, a non-profit organisation, to be inclusive and is accessible to anybody with a GPS-enabled smartphone. A press of a button dispatches the nearest emergency responders to the citizen’s GPS coordinates and has been shown to be 11x faster than conventional systems. The system also allows for live tracking of vehicles and alerts to improve accountability and responsiveness.
The public are encouraged to test the power of Namola for themselves by downloading it for free here . Reporting an emergency via the app will trigger a call from the Namola call centre so be sure to answer the call when testing or an emergency vehicle will be sent to your location. Namola. Connecting Citizens To Safety. #MakeSASafe #CrimeMustFall
