Ted Leggett
As if the South African Police Service (SAPS) wasn’t in enough hot water over the filming of police brutality by BBC-TV, it recently had to deal with a series of attacks from the country’s deputy president.
At an election rally in the Indian suburb of Chatsworth recently, a police member asked Thabo Mbeki what the African National Congress government is doing to reduce the number of police killings. Apparently tired of the subject after having spoken passionately at a police memorial the previous weekend, Mbeki flipped the question back on the policeman, asking him why these officers were being killed and who was killing them.
Mbeki then answered his own question, alleging that “studies” have shown police personnel are killing each other in order to cover up their own acts of corruption.
“Unless the police come clean on the matter,” Mbeki said, “questions as to why they are being killed and suspicions that they are killing one another for corruption practices will remain unresolved.”
Essentially, the deputy president has said to the police, which has seen more than 1 200 of its members murdered since 1994, that they have no one to blame but themselves.
Until Mbeki backs his claim with evidence that a substantial percentage of police deaths are self-inflicted, his public statement will stand as an undiplomatic kick in the teeth to the already demoralised police force.
But the deputy president has refused to provide such evidence, relying on statements by his representative that Mbeki, due to the nature of his office, is privy to information on sensitive investigations not available to the general public. This claim raises several questions.
If the material was indeed “sensitive”, why was Mbeki using this information in political repartee at an election rally? And why are these studies so secret that not even the government officials charged with investigating police killings have ever heard of them?
The Independent Complaints Directorate (ICD) is the government body assigned to investigate all deaths caused by police officers, as well as claims of police corruption.
Before Mbeki’s pronouncement, neither the executive director nor the provincial directors of the offices in Gauteng, Cape Town or Durban had heard of Mbeki’s studies.
Furthermore, none of these officials could recall more than one or two cases in which a police officer killed another that could possibly be tied to corruption.
Apparently, the national commissioner and the Ministry of Safety and Security are equally baffled.
Rival political parties have been quick to capitalise on the statement, suggesting Mbeki was citing a National Intelligence Agency source. If true, this shows a disturbing lack of confidence in the official channels of investigation on the part of the executive, aside from the implications of using spies to police the police.
The Democratic Party has made further use of the opening to offer a R500 000 reward fund for evidence leading to the arrest of police killers.
The New National Party, apparently upset that it had not thought of the idea first, accused the DP of hypocrisy for supporting the amendment of Section 49, which the NNP claims will cause more police deaths by limiting the use of firearms.
In fact, the amendment brings police use of force into line with that in the rest of the civilised world. The new rule merely requires the police to use reasonable force, and prevents them from shooting suspects who pose no risk of serious harm to the officer or the public. The rights to self-defence and defence of others remain unchanged under this legislation.
Some damage control was managed by Minister of Safety and Security Sydney Mufumadi, who on Wednesday offered an additional reward – R250 000 – to those providing information leading to the conviction of police killers. He also proposed the appointment of a “multi-disciplinary committee” to look into the matter.
Mbeki’s statement has, predictably, caught the attention of the unions.
Last week, the South African Police Union (Sapu) and the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) reportedly condemned the deputy president’s statement at a meeting in Soweto dedicated to the topic of police killings, and resolved to drop all other work whenever the killing of a fellow officer required investigation.
But this display of unity between the two unions was short lived.
Last weekend Mbeki dug himself in deeper when he alleged police in the Western Cape are in collusion with gangsters.
He also said: “The majority of people in the Cape are coloured, and as long as the top policemen are all white you have no hope of succeeding in the fight against crime.”
Sapu has again condemned Mbeki’s accusations, but someone seems to have reminded Popcru of its ties to the Congress of South African Trade Unions and its endorsement of the ANC in the 1999 general elections.
Not only did Popcru this week defer to the “privileged” information the deputy president might have about the situation in the Cape, but it managed to brainstorm among its ranks and come up with examples of police killings that might be due to “infighting”.
The union has recently arranged meetings with Mbeki to relay further “sensitive information”.
While the moral support might be appreciated, the few cases Popcru has cited to the media do not clearly involve corruption and could hardly be said to represent a significant trend. They certainly do not justify a statement which, unless substantiated and acted upon, does nothing but add insult to the injuries the police have suffered in recent years.
Since it is widely acknowledged that corruption is a problem in the police, the general public is likely to accept these allegations as true.
But is it right to accept Mbeki’s criticism solely on the weight of his personal authority? How does the executive expect police command to respond to such vague accusations?
It seems clear that one of two possible scenarios is the case.
If these “studies” are advanced enough for individuals to be identified and charged, then the general outlines of the investigation should be revealed to the public, or at least to the ICD.
If, on the other hand, they are so preliminary that no information can be disclosed, the deputy president erred in introducing them into the public dialogue.
Ted Leggett is a researcher in the Centre for Social and Developmental Studies at the University of Natal