Sanco marches to court

The South African National Civic Organisation (Sanco) members marched last year to hand over a memorandum complaining about certain issues.

The memorandum was handed over to the Justice Crime Prevention and Security (JCPS) clusters departments or stakeholders compromising of the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development, the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), the Local District Court Judiciary and the South African Police Service (SAPS).

This year again on the same date Sanco marched to complaining about the delay in response to the memorandum.

Mr Paul Mthimunye was stopped while he was trying to read a response of the memorandum by Sanco officials.

They indicated that they expected some more and he was send back to consult with the other department and meet Sanco again.

A copy of the response was received from the JCPS and it reads thus:

The cluster departments after receiving the memorandum decided to do a collective response to the Sanco memorandum of concerns submitted on April 12 last year (2018).

The departments firstly unconditional and profusely apologies for the delay in providing a feedback to the memorandum and they then took collectively responsibility for the serious delay and promised that it will not happen in the future.

The JCPS within the criminal justice system stated that they share similar concerns with Sanco and the community at large with the regard to unacceptable level of crime and are willing to work together and cooperate with the community in matters of common interest such as fighting crime, gender based violence, child abuse, abductions, human trafficking, intimate or femicide killings, body mutilation for muti purposes and the killing of people with albinism, the use of drugs, possession and dealing in drugs, armed robberies and murder to name a few of them.

“The JCPS pledged to work with Sanco and the community of eMalahleni in these issues to fight the scourge of crime in the area and the surrounds, including villages, towns and the suburbs and the farming community. We further avail ourselves in the representative capacity to engage further through the Department of Justice’s court management in collaboration with the regional and the national office of the department and the JCPS structures to also create a stakeholders management forum with interested parties, organisations and the civil society at large.”

On the promise of the establishment of a high court in eMalahleni the department highlighted that a high court has been provided for and Delmas and that those two do not relate fulfilment of the promise made for eMalahleni and that the community would not rest until they get their own court as per the promise.

The department stated that they have noted with interest the plight of the community and Sanco in general in that regard.

It has deliberated on the aspect intensely to the extent that it has reached a resolve to accommodate the outcry of the community.

The department also had inputs on bail, witness protection programme, cases of intimate femicide, alleged corruption of officials or members of NPA and domestic violence and harassment cases and the conviction rate at Witbank court.

The SAPS had imputs on loss of dockets, application of bail provision by SAPS, measures to increase SAPS members, alleged corruption within SAPS members and the establishment of Community Policing Forum (CPF).

The District Court Judicial inputs was that they are of the view that their participation in the Sanco process will be limited to internal stakeholder meeting and that they are prepared to contribute the views on the cash flow management aspects in relation to the issues of judicial oversight.

They further added to state that the judicial oversight in carrying their responsibilities is guided by the judicial norms and standards as issued by the chief justice and judge president.