Problems between the Scorpions and the police are among the inevitable challenges of managing a society’s law enforcement, the Institute of Security Studies said on Friday.
In a submission to the Khampepe Commission, it said: ”Relocating the Directorate of Special Operations (DSO) into the police does not eliminate the problem, it simply shifts the responsibility for dealing with it.”
The commission, headed by Judge Sisi Khampepe, entered its fifth day of public hearings into the future of the Scorpions, which operates as an elite crime-busting unit.
It currently falls under the NPA, as the Directorate of Special Operations (DSO).
Options being bandied around the table at the commission are whether to disband the Scorpions, relocate it within the police, or change its mandate.
Initial reasons for establishment of the DSO in 1999 were the concern that the police could not adequately deal with complex forms of organised crime and corruption.
Anthony Altbeker, for the ISS, said the argument of police weakness no longer justified organisational separation from the DSO.
The SAPS, in its submission on Wednesday, made the case that their skills and technology and training were on an international level.
Moreover, submissions also suggested that the management and administration of DSO had been far from optimal.
The Scorpions used team-based investigations involving detectives, intelligence analysts, forensic accountants and the prosecutors who led the investigations.
Altbeker argued that it was crucial that capability to mount investigations into complex and sophisticated crimes be retained.
”The crisp question is whether this capability needs to exist separately from [the] SAPS.”
One of the issues under discussion is the constitutional provision that there be only one prosecution authority in the country.
”As a result, procedural challenges to investigations led by prosecutors in the employ of [the] police would be inevitable,” Altbeker said.
The ISS contended that the legal difficulty was not the most serious problem.
Altbeker said it was undesirable to have prosecutors who were deciding whether or not to take a case to court being answerable to police officers, as this might undermine the prosecution’s independence.
Altbeker submitted the the police service had a problem attracting and retaining highly skilled professionals, partly because its pay structures could not compete with the private sector.
”Although salaries have improved in the police force… there remain concerns about the extent to which these are adequate.
”Indeed, the SAPS has, in recent years, resorted to paying once-off bonuses to skilled staff in order to encourage them to remain in the organisation,” said Altbeker.
He said the context in which the DSO was created had changed because the SAPS was not as hamstrung as it had been. However, many of the reasons for establishing the elite crime-busting unit remained.
A challenge in merging the two bodies was that a policing agency was not a good home for a prosecutor, as both had separate cultures.
The nature of the DSO’s mandate virtually guaranteed conflict between itself and SAPS because there were no clear-cut rules of jurisdiction over certain cases.
The common perception was that the DSO then selected cases that suited it ”either because these might reflect well on the DSO or because they are relatively straightforward”.
Altbeker admitted the current situation was not optimal, and suggested mechanisms to foster inter-organisational co-operation.
He cautioned against repositioning the DSO simply because of the controversy that had broken out about some of its decisions.
”Such controversy cannot be avoided,” said Altbeker.
Difficulties in incorporating the investigative body into the SAPS could be foreseen both now and in the future, and even if this was a successful transplantation a new set of difficulties could be expected to arise within that organisation.
The commission was appointed by President Thabo Mbeki in March to advise him on the future of the Scorpions.
The hearings continue. – Sapa