Gavin Foster
He stands there, day after day, letting the good guys in and keeping the baddies out. Well, that’s what he’s supposed to do. But the chances are he’s just a pawn in paranoid South Africa’s scam of the century – pseudo-security.
It’s difficult to say how many of the 160 000 workers registered with the Security Officers Board are deployed at access control points around the country, but a fair proportion of the R11-billion paid to the security industry each year must arise from these services.
The problem often is that once the guards have completed their training, no one seems to be too concerned whether they actually do anything to enhance security or not.
Even the clients are indifferent to what they’re getting for their money. At R12,50 per hour no one expects top-notch security, but a modicum of common sense would be a reasonable expectation.
We decided to test some of the systems to see how interested the security guards in Durban were in delivering what their companies offer.
Our modus operandi was simple. We would arrive at the checkpoint and ask the guard to read out the vehicle registration number. We would take care to transpose some of the digits when writing the number down on the entry form, and return the clipboard to the guard after inserting a nonsensical name, company and reason for visit in the required fields.
Our first hiccup occurred at Flamingo Park, north of Durban. I arrived on a motorcycle and was promptly waved through without any formality – all cars were stopped.
The officer, provided by Vikela KwaZulu Security, obviously believes that motorcyclists are a trustworthy bunch – a belief that was later mirrored at a number of other sites. We returned to Flamingo Park by car, and the guard’s clipboard now records that on October 22, Guy Fawkes went through the checkpoint intent upon committing arson.
There must have been a gathering of celebrities in Durban that week, because Adolf Hitler of Plunder & Mayhem visited Mr Price’s head office to see his friend Mussolini, and Mickey Mouse of Disney popped into Delta Pac with the stated intent of molesting Minnie.
He must have failed, for he later entered the Independent Newspapers building in Greyville hoping to see the same lady. Not wanting to be upstaged, Hitler put in another appearance at a company called Linde in New Germany, claiming that the purpose of his visit was “murder and mayhem”. His entrance, alas, went unnoticed.
Elsewhere, things were no better. The guard at Industrial Consumer Plastics (ICP) in New Germany was unfazed to read that Mickey Mouse wished to enter the premises, and studied the form long and hard before asking if Minnie worked there.
I told him that I thought so, and he accepted my word, but asked me three times if I was carrying a firearm. Twice I told him I was not, but when he asked the third time I decided that he must have seen the bulge under my jacket, so I owned up. He asked me to remove the magazine and leave it in the car and then allowed me in, still wearing my weapon, complete with one round in the chamber. He didn’t ask if I had a spare magazine, so I didn’t feel obliged to mention it. If he was meant to disarm me, the exercise was futile.
We included some large and reputable security companies in our survey. Wolf Security manned the checkpoint at Delta Pac, Mr Price was guarded by Khulani Springbok Patrols, Enforce Security did not do what their name implies at ICP, and ET Security Systems receives a monthly cheque from Linde for the laid- back service they render. Not once were my credentials questioned, and my incorrectly written registration number was never queried.
According to Professor Hans Visser, vice-chair of the Security Officers Board, the extent of access control provided is largely dependent upon the clients’ requirements, and there’s a fine line between annoying the public by being too strict, and failing to render a service by being too lax.
“I’ve not had access to your investigations” he says, “but we’re interested in ensuring that a proper service is delivered to those who’re paying for it.”