Working conditions, personal circumstances and the ‘militaristic manner’ in which SAPS is managed have a detrimental effect on mental health, say experts. (Delwyn Verasamy/M&G)
“I drunk myself fucked up, picked up my gun and I wanted to do it.”
But the seasoned detective, at that stage a rookie, was afraid he would botch his suicide, and mustered the courage to contact his station commander.
He had sought relief in the bottle early in his career, he told the Mail & Guardian, but has been sober for 16 of his 20 years with the South African Police Service (SAPS), something he credits to formal rehabilitation and the will to improve his life.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, he recalled the day when he turned to booze to try to obliterate the realities of policing in South Africa.
“There was a shooting incident where gangsters were firing at each other. Civilians were passing by. One woman had a baby. The baby got shot in the head and died.”
It became the norm, experiencing this brutality, he says.
At some crime scenes, the victim would have only an officer to whom to utter their last words. Later, he would attend the postmortem with the victim’s family, but he pointed out: “We are not medically trained or professionals in that regard.”
Perhaps the most difficult case in his career, and one that drove him deeper into the bottle, was a baby so badly abused by its mother that it died.
“At the postmortem, even the doctor asked if we could step outside for a moment as you cannot handle what the child has gone through over that period of time,” he said. “All of that, it is fucking with your mind, man.”
“It builds up over time, and you don’t talk about it, you just shut people out, because everyone looks at you being a cop, like [you are supposed] to be superhuman, you are not supposed to show any sign of weaknesses.”
Stress in the service is ubiquitous, he says.
He remembers working late one night when he heard sobbing. “It was a moerse guy, some 2m tall and fit. In the police, people forget how to be human. You suffer in silence”.
“We do not have the proper support structures within SAPS. The morale is low in SAPS, and it can be attributed to a lot of things: discrimination, no proper assistance, corruption and promotions.”
There was a fear of speaking up, of sharing mental health challenges because it could count against an officer when promotions were considered, he says.
He was sent to the service’s employee health and wellness programme after admitting that he wanted to end his life, but the language barrier — not understanding or being understood — frustrated him.
“[At] that stage I was in a real state of depression, and I cannot speak to the social worker in a language that I’m comfortable in.” He was told to come back the next day.
“Tomorrow, I might be dead”.
Another officer, sergeant Mike Mhlongo, was stationed in the K9 unit in Empangeni, KwaZulu-Natal. He began his police career in 2003.
Mhlongo died of suicide in 2021.
His widow, Nompumelelo Mpanza, tells the M&G the unanswered questions she has about her husband’s mental state — and what drove him to take his own life — are intensely painful.
“I noticed quite a lot of change to his demeanour before he fatally shot himself in June last year. Mhlongo was by nature a very quiet and humble person, but he started withdrawing more from the family and looked really pained,” she says.
“When I would repeatedly ask him to share what he was grappling with, he would just reply: ‘I cannot tell you many things because you won’t understand: you’re not a police officer. You can’t help me with anything’.”
“I have to live with the guilt of not being able to help my children’s father,” says Mpanza.
She is adamant that more needs to be done to support police officers. Without that support, she says, suicide trends will increase, as will murder-suicides.
“My husband loved his family and he killed himself without harming me or our three children. But you see some officers kill their families before committing suicide, which shows that there are many problems in the SAPS.”
Police union Popcru has warned of the “alarming” number of suicides among South Africa’s men and women in blue, going so far as to say that “urgent measures” are needed to address officers’ mental health.
“It builds up over time, and you don’t talk about it, you just shut people out, because everyone looks at you being a cop, like [you are supposed] to be superhuman, you are not supposed to show any sign of weaknesses.” (Oliver Petrie/Getty Images)
Police management contends that suicide in its ranks has actually decreased in the past three years, but is unwilling to share its figures.
The potential for mental strain and the very real possibility of physical harm among officers was again highlighted this week as social and traditional media exploded with myriad video clips and photographs of a foiled cash-in-transit heist in the south of Johannesburg that led to multiple deaths.
While citizens were spectators to the carnage, officers, particularly from the service’s elite Special Forces and Tactical Response Team (TRT), were exchanging rapid gunfire with heavily armed thugs intent on shooting their way out of arrest. It was these officers who walked through the blood and body matter of criminals — and their injured colleagues — and who took in the unmistakable stench.
It is precisely such violence — according to Popcru and experts on policing — and the very real possibility of being killed in action and the effect that could have on their families, that plays on the minds of officers and takes a toll on their mental health. Combined with other factors, such as personal circumstances, the risk of suicide is heightened.
Popcru spokesperson Richard Mamabolo told the M&G that there were 20 reported suicides among SAPS members in 2021, the same number as in 2020. The unit most affected was TRT, he said, but officers who are the first responders at violent crime scenes are also at high risk of severe emotional stress and psychological shock.
That trauma manifests in insomnia, sleep disturbance and vivid recollections of violent experiences.
SAPS members are 11 times more likely to die of suicide than the average South African citizen, according to Popcru, and five times more likely to die of suicide than their international counterparts.
There is limited data available to track police suicides in the country, but according to a 206 paper by Gráinne Perkins, titled Shedding light on the hidden epidemic of police suicide in South Africa, 115 officers died by suicide between 2012 and 2013, compared to the 29 officers murdered on duty during the same period. It found 98 officers died of suicide in 2012 alone.
Additional data shows that in 2009, 73 police officers died of suicide. There was an upwards trend in 2010, with 97 deaths by suicide, whereas, in 2011, there were 85.
Using the average suicide rate of 49 per 100 000 people for the years 2009 to 2013, Simon Howell, a research associate at the Global Risk Governance Programme, estimates that last year, taking into account the 2021 police employee size of 182 000, 89 officers took their own lives.
A young officer based in the Western Cape, who also spoke to the M&G on condition of anonymity, said he knew what he signed up for when joining the service, but that a recent shoot-out with gang members had hammered home the fact that “when you receive a complaint, you never know if it is going to be your last”.
He had been tormented by “constant flashbacks” of the moment at which he thought he would be killed during the exchange of gunfire, said the officer, and was bedevilled by insomnia.
According to SAPS spokesperson colonel Athlenda Mathe, suicides in the service decreased between 2019 and 2021. The actual numbers could not be shared, said Mathe, as SAPS did not provide such information.
The problem within the police is because of these kind of militarised cultures, if they do go for the support, they tend to be sort of ostracised or marginalised and that affects their promotion potential
“Suicides in an organisation like SAPS are slightly higher compared to suicide by police officials in other African states, but almost the same with European countries like Mexico, Argentina, the USA and others. SAPS suicide figures for the past three financial years have slightly decreased, however, one suicide is one too many,” Mathe told the M&G.
SAPS contends that it offers support and care to all of its members and their families through the employee health and wellness programme, Popcru argues that the initiative has “dismally failed to achieve their objectives”.
The programme is reactive instead of proactive, according to the police union, with employee health and wellness representatives not understanding their roles and, in some instances, breaching confidentiality, which can significantly affect promotion.
According to Bethual Nephtal Nkuna, president of the Independent Policing Union of South Africa, police suicides are an end product of top managament’s failure to “proactively deal with members’ mental health problems”, despite the union asking that this be prioritised.
Working abnormally long hours without compensation, or being compensated much later, added to problems, including waning morale, said Nkuna.
According to Mathe: “The morale of the police members directly mirrors the morale of the entire population of South Africa. The high corruption rate … and high unemployment rate and a lot of uncertainty for South Africans is bound to affect the morale of both the citizens of the country and the police officers negatively.”
Guy Lamb, of Stellenbosch University’s political science department, said morale in any institution had to be contextualised to include personal circumstances and the type of work performed. In the policing sector, he said, context also needed to include station-level dynamics and the appropriate commander’s effect on personnel.
“If you have a very dynamic station commander who’s really supportive and trying to ensure that everyone is kind of happy [it can create an] open environment, versus if you’ve got a toxic leader, then it’s going to affect your morale kind of negatively,” said Lamb.
Addressing matters above station level, violence monitor Mary de Haas told the M&G there was an overarching policing crisis in the country that was “far more serious than people realise”.
Recently, the ongoing feud between Police Minister Bheki Cele and national commissioner police Khehla Sitole again made headlines after the former, in a parliamentary sitting, accused the top administrator of “plotting” with Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema to remove him from his post. Cele was ordered by the national assembly speaker to withdraw his comments, and did so, but Sitole later the same day issued a statement denying the allegation, saying his name was being tainted for political reasons.
The feud between Police Minister Bheki Cele and national police commissioner General Khehla Sitole has been long and arduous (Photo by Jaco Marais/Foto24/Gallo Images via Getty Images)
Calls to remove Cele and Sitole have long peppered public discourse, and were again intensified this month with the release of the presidential panel report into the July 2021 civil unrest. The report did not place either man in a particularly positive light, with their squabbles being highlighted as needing to be urgently resolved.
De Haas believes the minister is central to the SAPS crisis. “It is not a matter of replacing Sitole as national commissioner, as the whole national management is problematic.”
“The crisis is one of poor management, everywhere linked to the fact that Cele, as a minister, basically runs the police himself … as he seems not to understand that the role of a minister is quite distinct from engaging in operational matters,” she said.
Popcru added that there was a “pressing need” to deal with the “two blurring of responsibilities at the top level of the SAPS to avoid further weakening of both the management role of the commissioner and the oversight role of the minister.”
Lamb said that hierarchy and the militaristic manner in which SAPS is managed from its highest levels could also affect morale.
“Orders are given at the top. Those orders are coming down and you as an individual might feel that those orders don’t necessarily meet what your needs and concerns are. That obviously affects morale as well.”
Lamb believes Cele champions a “boys don’t cry approach” when dealing with mental health, trauma and emotional challenges.
“The problem within the police is because of these kind of militarised cultures [in which its believed] police shouldn’t need [emotional support], if they do go for the support, they tend to be sort of ostracised or marginalised and that affects their promotion potential.”
Popcru believes the mentally unhealthy work environment in the police service is “further compounded by limited chances of promotions, the shortages of resources and unfair practices in relation to compensation, coupled with the reality that there are inconsistencies in leadership, which continues to cause divisions in the law-enforcement environment”.
De Haas highlights “malicious disciplinary cases against decent police members” as a red flag for morale and mental health, particularly if those cases involve the victimisation of officers who challenge management on corruption, irregular appointments and promotions.
She encourages members of the public to get involved in community policing forums and “support the good guy and help expose the bad, since we cannot rely on politicians to do anything constructive and their priority is keeping themselves in power”.
The country’s policing structure is also problematic, according to De Haas. She argues that the service is too top-heavy with, high numbers of generals and brigadiers, who according to her, “are incompetent”.
“This gobbles up policing budget and there is no money for ordinary members,” De Haas said. “I believe we need a complete human resources [or] forensic audit of all senior police management appointments. But, as with other problems … if there is no political will to deal with [them]. things will probably go from bad to worse,” De Haas said.
If you are experiencing suicidal ideation, you can call the Lifeline 24-hour national counselling on 0861 322 322 or the South African Anxiety and Depression Group 24-hour suicide crisis helpline on 0860 567 567.
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