Up until a few weeks ago we were being prepared on a daily basis for a terrorist attack on Australian soil. Since then things have gone quiet. It is not a question of whether there will be an attack, but rather a question of timing. Without being a dooms day protagonist, it is necessary to be prepared and to have contingency plans in place especially if you are a retailer, because retail is a good target. I have experienced the devastating effect of terrorism in various parts of the world
. The social triggers vary worldwide.
On December 7, 1977 at the height of the apartheid era, a bomb exploded in the Carlton Centre, Johannesburg, injuring 16 people. Isaac Siko exploded the bomb in front of the Boulevard Restaurant. Several people were injured. I was working in a retail department store in the Carlton Centre when the bomb exploded.
On May 20, 1983 I was in my office in a retail department store in Church St in Pretoria when the Church St car bomb went off. Umkhonto we Sizwe, an activist group co-founded by Nelson Mandela, Joe Slovo, and Walter Sisulu which served as the military wing of the ANC, claimed responsibility. The bombing killed 19 and wounded 217, and was one of the largest attacks engaged in by the ANC during its armed struggle against apartheid.
The target was South African Air Force (SAAF) headquarters. The bomb went off 10 minutes earlier than planned, killing two ANC operatives in the vehicle, Freddie Shangwe and Ezekial Maseko.
The May 1998 riots in Indonesia were incidents of mass violence of a racial nature that occurred throughout Indonesia, mainly in Medan in the province of North Sumatra, the capital city of Jakarta, and Surakarta (also called Solo) in the province of Central Java. The riots were triggered by economic problems including food shortages and mass unemployment, and eventually led to the resignation of President Suharto and the fall of the New Order government. The main victims of the violence were ethnic Chinese.
It was estimated that more than a thousand people died in the Indonesian riots. At least 168 cases of rape were reported, and material damage was valued at more than Rupiah 3.1 trillion.
The Rupiah fell from 2500 to the USD to Rp4500 overnight. It then went into freefall during the following two weeks, almost hitting 17,000. Some retailers increased prices by 100 per cent immediately. Other retailers simply closed their doors – they didn’t know what price to sell at. Chinatown and many stores were burned to the ground. A colleague and I were the last to leave Karawaci Shopping Centre before the militants arrived and set it on fire.
Whatever the trigger, retail is regrettably a prime candidate for terrorists.
From our research so far, retailers in Australia are blissfully unaware of the issues surrounding terrorism and what they could and should be doing about them. They are not the only ones. Our airports have taken no physical steps to eliminate or reduce hazards.
Our firm is committed to educate and provide assistance to retailers in many spheres and in particular this one. We are in contact with The Australian Federal Police and the Attorney General’s Department, which has responsibility for Critical Infrastructure Protection.
Those who read this article may like to ask themselves the questions: “What are we doing to protect our staff, our customers and our business? What are our contingency plans post an attack, regardless of whether it is in one of our shopping centres or not? What impact will an attack have on our business and what steps have we in place to counteract this impact?”
Stuart Bennie is a retail consultant at Impact Retailing and can be contacted at stuart@impactretailing.com.au or 0414 631 702