Good Party: Pop-up cops will go pop

The Minister of Police, Bheki Cele, and Justice Minister Ronald Lamola – who head the country’s criminal justice system – have washed their hands of responsibility for quasi policing structures established in the Western Cape and Gauteng.

Both are clear that the City of Cape Town’s “law enforcement officers” and the Gauteng government’s “crime prevention wardens” operate without training standards or lawful authority – but neither appears to have the appetite to interfere.

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While the crime rate makes it difficult to argue against more police boots on the ground, permitting unlawful boots on the ground risks seeing important criminal cases derailed on technical/procedural grounds.

The ministers are abrogating their responsibility to South Africans to meaningfully address crime. Whether or not these pop-up police structures have any impact on crime doesn’t appear to matter as much as PR opportunities.

The politicians tell very different stories to the statistics… Recent research reported 1 000 incidents of gang violence in the Western Cape in three months between July and September, the vast majority in Cape Town.

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Many of these incidents were not reported to police. The impact of Cape Town’s enormous law-enforcement spend plain to see.

There is no question that the crime rate in SA demands more and more capable police. But the solution can’t be to resort to the tactics of PW Botha, who established units of poorly trained and ill-disciplined “kitscops”.

Cele and Lamola have been unambiguous in written responses to a series of parliamentary questions I’ve asked over the past six months, that the policing structures in the Western Cape and Gauteng were not lawfully established.

The reason for their unwillingness to intervene can only be the political risk of being seen to reduce the number of “police” on the streets in an environment of rampant crime – and with an election around the corner.

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In the most recent set of answers to questions submitted in October, Lamola says a notice issued in terms of the Criminal Procedure Act prescribed that a certificate of appointment can only be issued if the employer of a “law enforcement officer appointed by municipality” has been furnished with a certificate of competency by the national commissioner of the South African Police Service.

Cele has previously denied issuing certificates of competency in respect of the unlawful structures.

He said national training standards applied to members of municipal police services (metro police), but there were “no legal provisions that prescribe the training requirement in respect of the relevant functionaries”.

Asked to clarify the status of security officers not provided for in the constitution performing the functions of peace officers, armed with firearms, Cele said the “Firearms Control Act regulates official institutions, which includes any government institution accredited by the national commissioner”.

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Cele said he had no authority over functionaries who don’t resort under or report to the police department. In other words, according to Cele and Lamola, the Western Cape and Gauteng private police forces are laws unto themselves and the municipal and provincial politicians who created them.

There is an urgent need for South Africa to realign its approach to reducing crime. It is a manifestation of deep social wounds, divisions, exclusions – and a culture of impunity – that policing on its own will never fix. A professional police service is a critical piece in the puzzle.

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The steps we take next must take us in the direction of more compliance with the law, not less. Politicians should not play politics with peoples’ safety.

If they have money sloshing around in their budgets for private police forces, while Saps is short of cash, we need a national conversation about budgeting.

If more policing powers are to be delegated to municipalities and/or provinces, this must be done through proper legislative processes, regulating training and lines of accountability.