President of NASDEV, Mr Gugulethu Xaba;
Deputy President of NASDEV, Ms Nobuhle Mpambani;
Secretary General of NASDEV, Ms Tulas Majola;
The National Executive Committee of NASDEV;
Representatives of various Tertiary Institutions present;
Distinguished Guests;
Members of the Media;
Ladies and Gentlemen;
In May 2010 we addressed the National Association of Student Development (NASDEV) Conference held at Durban. Today, two years later we are honoured to have been invited again to address this important gathering.
In line with our approach in the fight against crime, such partnerships are crucial as they afford us opportunities to share our progress as well as derive valuable lessons from you as student practitioners.
As in the past, the youth laid its services at the disposal of the national liberation movement in the firm belief that the cause shall triumph. It is the same determination that is needed today to deal with the challenges we face, including tackling crime.
In the past, the youth and student movement led with honour the struggle for transformation of our education system. They knew their place in the struggle and paramount duty to advance the struggle for universally access to education for the people.
A lot of progress has been made in the past two years as noted from the crime statistics and this to a large extent can be attributed to the contribution of different partners from different spheres, yet who all share a common vision: a safe and secure country. Our presence in honouring this invite should therefore be understood from such as premise, which is, to strengthen the partnership against crime.
Central to crime reduction; yes as the police we planned better, we coordinated our programmes more effectively, deployed resources and personnel efficiently however one cannot ignore the important role of communities. For one to better grasp and understand safety concerns of citizens one needs to be within the communities, continuously engage and develop sustainable solutions around safety.
The youth must be central to these dialogues. The youth must also be the brains-trust and power-station of the spirit of patriotism.
This relates to such issues as access to education, social and economic opportunities, engendering activism around issues of development and values of community solidarity and creating the space for youth creativity to flourish.
We have begun the review process of the White Paper on Safety and Security which was finalised in 1998. Since then there have been changes in the policing environment that need to be incorporated and reflected in our policy and approaches. In due course, it will be placed before Parliament as part of the public comment process and we would urge NASDEV to make inputs.
As we implement our strategies, one of the crucial aspects to effective policing, is around training. Whether one looks at specialised training, firearm handling, crowd control, forensics, and taking statements at police stations – unless we address and pay attention to these kinds of trainings, we shall not achieve the kind of results we aim to.
This said, for us to swiftly and effectively fight crime; we need to ensure we have police officers who are well-trained on an on-going basis. That is why the first step was a review of our current recruitment process, as you would know by now; we have changed the period from 12 months to 24 months incorporating both theoretical and practical aspects.
The focus is centred on continuous improvement. We shall also ensure that we continuously bench-mark our training with international standards and other police departments worldwide, more so if we are to deal a blow to international crime syndicates.
But like any other profession, we must always strive to excel in what we do. For example, we are now beginning to improve our forensics because amongst other approaches, we have retrained our personnel; including inviting some of the local and international experts in this field to capacitate our members.
Yes, we cannot only focus on new recruits but we must also empower those that are within. Skills development and the retention of skills will remain priorities for the ministry during this 2012/2013 financial year and beyond.
The question may be how do we plan to achieve this? We believe we shall accomplish this through focused recruitment of personnel with emphasis on skills, instead of volume-based recruitment. We will also retain a sufficient pool of skilled competent personnel, specifically within identified scarce skills occupational categories.
We need to further emphasise that as we review the policing functions we also want to ensure that we apportion some of the functions, which were not in the previous White Paper on Safety and Security. If one looks at the current legislation, somehow police are expected to solve even matters that are beyond their control, for example, policing areas which have no street lights or road infrastructure. This would become a local government function.
Part of the review process will take into account the issue of police station demarcations. The policy relating to the new demarcations is being reviewed, as part of the broader review of the White Paper on Safety.
Perhaps we could take this point further by emphasising our policy position around building police stations. One of our approaches in dealing with crime will be in ensuring that we build police stations in areas which, for whatever reason, were neglected in the past. It is unacceptable for some communities to travel distances to report criminals.
It is equally unacceptable that in cases where they do reach these police stations, they then discover that their resources are pathetic. To have police stations without proper sanitation and electricity is unacceptable and compromises our momentum.
That is why the priority will be to build police stations around rural areas and townships; and to ensure they are correctly capacitated not only with committed personnel, but improved systems and operations. This will then intensify our resolve to win this war on crime. It will further make a categorical statement that no longer would we allow this community to walk long distances to lodge a complaint or report any criminal activity.
Once police stations are built, they must not become mere structures. These do not just become properties of government; they belong to the communities. And that is why we need to have active community policing forums (CPFs).
CPFs are elected forums at station level that represent the community in their engagement with the SAPS. A key aspect of the CPF system is that the police service and the CPF have different roles in this partnership, but work towards the same objective.
As opposed to reservists who volunteer to do police work under the command and control of the SAPS, CPF members work ‘with’ SAPS and for their community, and not ‘for’ SAPS. As police enter into partnership with diverse partners, the main objective is to improve the local safety.
This can be achieved through taking proactive initiatives to address factors that cause or enable crime to take place; to improve communication mediums in addressing crime. In addition such partnership must promote co-operation by ensuring joint problem identification and joint problem solving. That is why we caution against politicking by some arm-chair critics to refrain from using police stations as political platforms. We shall not allow that.
The values and principles which underpin partnership policing are: that all partners must provide mutual acknowledgement and respect for ideas, interests, issues and position of each partner. These parties must therefore commit to work together to identify and achieve common goals, and thereby strive to reach consensus-based decisions.
We intend to enter into many partnerships with diverse partners, and that is why structures such as NASDEV are crucial. As a youth-driven organisation, you might outline your developmental agenda and not be consumed into being used as political platforms by some who want to serve narrow agendas, but be active participants in the advancement of democracy.
We need partners with no hidden agendas but people who will put the nation’s safety above their own personal interests. That is why we refrain from entering into a partnership for political motives or for purposes of exploitative advantage.
In the recent weeks we have seen through the media, social and public platforms very inhumane and disturbing images of teenage rapes across the country. Whilst we focused our attention on resolving this challenge, some unfortunately became opportunistic and played the blame-game on police. We warn against such unfounded and narrow criticism. We do encourage oversight on police, especially by society, but such oversight must be frank and fair.
By encouraging a positive role for the institution of the family and community, youth involvement in a variety of social endeavours, patriotism and civic responsibility, community activism, sporting and other social activities; we will seek to promote healthy lifestyles, moral integrity and role models informed by human compassion, generosity, incorruptibility and accountability.
Towards the end of last year I began a countrywide consultation, interacting with the SAPS Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences (FCS) management. To my surprise, police had secured in total over 300 life sentences and we have to say upfront, this was no mean feat or a child’s play. The only failure on the part of police was communication. They had failed to communicate these good achievements, which would have boosted their image in the eyes of the communities.
We have now tasked them to improve in this area because by communicating such successes. This needs to be a continuing norm because police must move beyond arresting criminals but ensure the secure harsher sentences of criminals who rape, abuse and torture women, children and the elderly.
Some of these matters are not primarily security matters, we need a multi-disciplinary approach because we are dealing with social ills, and hence we would need the intervention of departments such as health, social development and justice. The serial rapists travel from province to province and this therefore calls for coordination amongst provincial provinces. If society expects police to police this scourge, it is a pipe dream. We all have a role in our different spheres and expertise.
Government is intent on dealing with this scourge, which in the main is difficult for police to police as it happens amongst acquaintances. The latest crime statistics also indicated that this crime category has been on the increase in the past few years.
That is why two years ago, when we addressed NASDEV we urged you to be involved in youth development programmes. As you reflect on your 25 years of student activism, you also need to pause and reflect on what roles have you played in the safety of society.
The government seeks to mobilise all South Africans to contribute to the on-going transformation of our country. In doing this, we strive to appeal to and foster a common sense of South Africanness and a shared responsibility for our common destiny among all citizens of South Africa, black and white.
The middle strata constitute a critical resource of social transformation project. This strata includes the intelligentsia, small business operators and professionals. Besides their varied identification with either of the main classes, these strata - especially the intelligentsia - not only provide professional skills, but also are critical in the determination of culture and value systems.
They are called upon to play an active role in the provision of a variety of services to the population; in fostering a culture of searching for new and better ways of doing things; and in promoting progressive intellectual discourse through the media, the arts and other platforms.
The democracy we have also means engendering freedom of the human spirit to search for better ways of doing things, to express one freely and to enjoy the creative endeavours of humanity. But, informed by the precepts of the country's Constitution, including the Bill of Rights, we do recognise that attached to individual freedom is individual responsibility; attached to collective freedom is collective responsibility.
We must ensure a youth environment that is not conducive to crime. The marginalised represent an easy target for gangs and syndicates; the community and its leaders should therefore pay attention to the issue of social exclusion.
We also are aware that amongst you as student leaders, do get into confrontations with police, wittingly or unwittingly as you raise demands with your respective educational institutions. Let us take this opportunity to emphasise that as the ministry we have now developed and are putting into implementation the Public Order Policing (POP) strategy. The tensions between police and tertiary students during protest must be a thing of the past.
This notion is strengthened by the constant negative public scrutiny of current policing methods and approaches applied during such protests and gatherings. Based on this notion our policy approach to public order policing dictated that we must re-establish and maintain POPs Units which have the necessary capacity, command and control structures to effectively carry out public order policing.
In the South African context, any operational policing strategy must take into account the operational environment and should be based upon sound democratic principles, which do not infringe on the human rights of citizens, whilst simultaneously protecting innocent citizens against any threat which might be posed by the public protest.
The success of effective response by the SAPS with regard to public order policing is dependent on a strong line of command and control. It has been proved that command and control has different meaning to different people. Within the context of policing public protests, command and control simply means that certain people must know that they have different roles to play.
There is also a need to implement approaches which would in the immediate term have an impact on crime levels, which would also lead to communities having greater confidence in the police. In crafting this policy, we needed to be frank about what was working and what required serious attention and intervention when it came to handling of public protests. We needed to examine key areas of policing and focus on a few selected areas that would significantly impact on crime.
As am I about to conclude, I would like to further draw your attention on the results of the Victims of Crime Survey 2011, conducted by Statistics South Africa, in all nine provinces in South Africa from January to March 2011, we can draw some encouragement on our progress in the fight against crime. Amongst its main objectives, were to look at the nature, extent and patterns of crime in South Africa, from the victim’s perspective.
One of the key findings in relation to the public perceptions about crime and safety was that more than 40% of the households believed that the level of both violent and non-violent crime had decreased in their area of residence during period the 2008 to 2010.
In relation to the public perceptions of law enforcement; about 60% of households were satisfied with the way police and courts are doing their work – e.g. the time it took for the police to respond to a crime, visible policing, conviction rates, and sentencing of perpetrators. Furthermore, 70.8% of households were of the opinion that police are trustworthy.
Such positive endorsements indeed confirm our assertion and observation that the tide against criminals is turning, that citizens and government are now having an upper hand. We dare not become complacent and say our work is complete but we must all be motivated to do more.
Government will consolidate partnerships across society to strengthen social cohesion and ensure that our nation achieves the values of a caring society, inspired by the traits of human compassion which informed our struggle against colonialism and apartheid.
On its part the State must facilitate and lead the developmental and the definition of a common national agenda and in mobilising all of society to take part in its implementation. Therefore, such a State should have effective systems of interaction with all social partners including academics, and exercise leadership informed by its popular mandate.
I charge all the patriots within the academic world with the task of ensuring that we continue to build and produce a cadre ship that will see it as its responsibility to advance our society to new paths.
On this day, we call on all patriots of our land, regardless of race, creed or social stratum to close ranks in our efforts for social transformation. We enjoin the academia to spread itself across the entire face of our country, delivering the message of a brighter future with education.
From the past and the present we have demonstrated that South Africans remain as before, gallant men, women and youth to whom cowardice and submissiveness to the challenges of the day, is foreign. The need for the unity of the patriotic and democratic forces of our country has never been greater than it is today.
We invite all patriots in their various organisational formations to seek and find ways of cooperation and collaboration in the quest for social justice in our country.
The future is bright. The end is glorious; it is peaceful. But the intervening period is dark, bitter and finds its glory in the act of struggle.
I thank you.
Zweli Mnisi
Tel: 012 393 4341 & 021 467 7007
Fax: 012 393 2833 & 021 467 7033
Cell: 082 045 4024
E-mail: zwelim@saps.org.za
Remarks by Minister of Police, E.N. Mthethwa at the National Association of Student Development(NASDEV) Practitioners Bi-Annual Conference,
Emperors Palace, Boksburg, Gauteng
