A battle of wills between the government and the opposition over the release of crime statistics continued to rage in the South African National Assembly on Tuesday — with the police minister insisting that he would only release them ”later this year”.
Amid a campaign blizzard by the official opposition for government to take crime seriously, Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said the statistics from his department would be tabled in Parliament ”later this year as part of the SAPS annual report … this accords with international norms regarding the release of crime statistics”.
He said, however, that he could report that ”the stabilisation trend in relation to selected priority crimes is continuing with murder still on the decrease and for the first time since 1994, a decrease in the rape figures and significant decreases in aggravated robberies, street robberies, common burglaries and theft”.
However, he noted that the latter were still a matter of concern.
But Douglas Gibson, official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) security spokesperson said the African National Congress (ANC) government ”has lost touch with what ordinary South Africans feel and experience on a daily basis”.
”When I raised the question of the murder rate with the minister in Parliament recently and pointed out that although the 2000 police statistics show a murder rate of 21 683, the Medical Research Council shows that the number of murders is 32 482.
”The minister had the perfect opportunity in the House to explain and to give us the correct figures. Instead of which he ducked the issue and said that crime is not fought with statistics.
”I want to tell the … minister that he might regard the number of people murdered as mere statistics. The wives and the children and the loved ones who are left behind do not regard those murdered as simply statistics. There are bodies and dead people involved, each one of whom was failed by the criminal justice system.
”If the police say only 21 000 were murdered what has happened to all of the cases which should be investigated? Does this mean that the police are not pursuing an additional 12 000 murderers? Are they unaware of the fact that these murders have taken place? All of this is unconscionable,” Gibson charged.
Regarding the report of the committee of inquiry into farm attacks, Nqakula said he received a progress report from committee chairperson Charl du Plessis on Monday, which also gave an indication of some of the main findings so far.
These included that ”by far the largest impetus behind farm attacks in the narrow sense of the word is of a purely criminal nature, namely the desire to rob”.
The committee could find no evidence that farm attacks per se were part of an orchestrated campaign to drive white farmers off the land.
However, the committee believed suitable steps should be taken to deal with illegal land occupations to prevent it becoming a crime risk.
Nqakula said he would discuss these issues as a matter of urgency with the minister of agriculture and land affairs, and with the commissioners of the Land Claims Commission.
The committee’s full and final report was expected within a month.
Turning to the scheduled replacement of the commando system by a revised SAPS reservist system, he said reservists were in the process of being recruited from existing structures.
These included the defence force commandos and the more than 75 000 volunteers who participated in the recent Letsema campaign.
To phase out the commando system and implement the new reservist system, defence force exit and police entry plans had now been completed, and would be introduced over six years, Nqakula said.
He also repeated his warning that political violence would not be tolerated.
”Any person who engages in this will be arrested and criminally prosecuted… we remain alert for any other eventualities from those bent on political violence.”
Vigilantism would also not be tolerated.
”No-one has the right to take the law into their own hands. The police are there and are making every effort to deal with incidents of crime.” – I-Net Bridge, Sapa