The Booysens policemen who were filmed accepting bribes from alleged illegal immigrants were still on the beat on Thursday, four days after Gauteng police management were alerted to the alleged corruption.
And while two of the policeman were clearly shown accepting bribes in the South African Broadcasting Corporation’s Special Assignment programme, Gauteng police say this may not be enough to secure their successful prosecution.
An office worker who did not want to be identified told the Mail & Guardian Online on Thursday that: ”It looks like they are still at work”.
According to Gauteng Provincial Commissioner Perumal Naidoo, ”visuals alone in my opinion is insufficient to secure a successful prosecution”.
Breaking his silence for the first time since viewing the footage on Monday, Naidoo said he had instituted a disciplinary process as well as a criminal investigation into the alleged corruption.
He was invited to view the footage before it was shown to the public on Tuesday, and apparently stormed out of the SABC studios.
He said the investigation into the alleged corruption would be conducted by ”a very senior police officer”.
Police spokesperson Senior Superintendent Mary Martins-Engelbrecht said the disciplinary hearing would run concurrently with the criminal investigation.
Martins-Engelbrecht said the senior policeman did not want to be identified.
”We’re not going to judge and investigate this trial in the media,” she said.
Martins-Engelbrecht said a notice of ”possible suspension” had been issued to the policemen involved in the alleged corruption.
”At the moment we are looking to suspend them,” said Martins-Engelbrecht.
She said that the investigation would not have a time limit.
Engelbrecht said the ”majority of the police officials are not corrupt” and that the case at the Booysens police station doesn’t ”warrant a wider [investigation] because there are no grounds there”.
Fabian Borman, a candidate attorney at the Wits Law Clinic, said the successful prosecution of the policeman involved in the alleged bribery would ”come down to evidence”.
”If you can make out the suspects then it would be considered enough” to prosecute the policemen, said Borman.
However, he added that ”you would still need a witness to testify that that was the man [who] accepted the bribe”.
Jacques Pauw, director of the Special Assignment programme said according to his research, bribery was rife within the SAPS.
”There has to be some concerted effort by the police to stamp this out.”
How it all began
Pauw said it was during the course of conducting interviews for another story about Rosettenville that he had found out about the alleged corruption at the Booysens police station.
Pauw said a Zimbabwean man agreed to help him expose the alleged corruption and then filmed the policemen accepting bribes with a hidden miniature video camera that had been attached to his clothes.
DA calls for investigation
Meanwhile, the South African Press Association reports that the Democratic Alliance (DA) has called for ”an immediate and sweeping” investigation of possible bribery by police throughout Gauteng.
”Only then can the public be assured that we are guarded by the good guys rather than by crooks,” said DA spokesperson John Moodey.
Amid public outrage at the alleged corruption, other people came forward on Wednesday with their stories of alleged police corruption.
A Zimbabwean woman working as a domestic worker in Johannesburg, told Sapa she had to pay a bribe while being held at the Lindela Repatriation Centre for illegal immigrants.
”When I was at Lindela an immigrations officer told us that if we have an ID book then we can pay R300 and they will let us out. If you don’t have an ID they want R500 or R1 000. It depends,” she said.
The immigration officer on duty at Lindela took the woman’s identity document, which she said she acquired legally, and told her to collect it in 21 days.
”When I went back to collect it I phoned the man, but he did not come outside. I had to apply for a new one,” she said.
A Malawian working as a gardener in Johannesburg’s northern suburbs, paid a R500 bribe to a police officer after he was arrested for being an illegal immigrant.
”The first time I paid the police R500 and they released me,” he said.
The next time he was arrested he had to pay someone at Lindela. – Sapa