R100 million for SAPS 30 ‘hell-stations’ means nothing if Cele’s not sacked
“You can’t win the Durban July with a donkey. Cele is useless and should know that a R100 million allocation will be fruitless on ground level if national leadership in SAPS is not restructured with a skills audit and the police minister replaced with someone competent and respectable,” said Ian Cameron, Director of Community Safety at Action Society.
This reaction was caused after Bheki Cele, Minister of Police, announced that R100 million has been allocated to the top 30 most dangerous police precincts in South Africa after the dooming crime statistics applicable to the last quarter of the 2021/22 financial year were recently released.
Cameron said, “What is worse is that Cele says that station commanders would be held accountable on their own if these stations do not show improvement and may even be sacked. Even though they must be held accountable for poor performance, how can a station commander be blamed for SAPS not functioning from the top down?”
Action Society is opposed to more tax money being wasted again whilst the real detriment of the South African Police Service lies in cadre deployment by the ruling party throughout the police service.
“Cadre deployment in the South African Police Service should never even have been an option as it has literally killed thousands of people. Thousands of murders and rapes could have been prevented had the police not become a political iron fist of a certain political elite in South Africa.”
Action Society is of the opinion that the solutions are simple and a once-off R100 million will certainly not fix the root of the problems that the SAPS is facing.
List of solutions:
- Do a skills audit within the South African Police Service to determine the merit of appointments and where there is no merit, that specific member must be sacked.
- Polygraph all members, starting with leadership, to determine whether they have been involved in any corrupt activities and where it is the case, sack them.
- Restore crime intelligence capabilities.
- Reinstate specialised units that can deal with serious violent crime effectively without having to live in the community they work in.
- Crime kingpins, including those part of the state, need to be targeted and taken out of operation.
- Restore reservist capabilities, especially to support specialised units. It is of utmost importance that these reservists do not come from the said communities in order for intimidation to be limited.
- Pay police members properly.
- Implement police devolution in the Western Cape as a proof of concept.
ISSUED BY: Action Society
DATE: 13 June 2022
FOR MEDIA ENQUIRIES:
Ian Cameron
Spokesperson: Action Society
Cell: 073 388 0474
or
Kaylynn Palm
Action Society Media Liaison Officer
Cell: 063 672 9256
