'Police must lead by example at all times, particularly in safeguarding women and children'.
The Deputy Minister of Police, Ms Maggie Sotyu today urged the Independent Complaints Directorate (ICD) to investigate police rapes without fear or favour and to ensure it holds police management accountable to provide reports on police rapes and detainee rapes in police cells.
She was speaking at the ‘ICD – Embrace Dignity Workshop’ held at the Townhouse Hotel, Cape Town this morning. According to Mr Francois Beukman, Executive Director of ICD, the purpose of the workshop was to engage relevant stakeholders on the new legislative mandate of the directorate and it approach to investigation of rape. “To create awareness among and instil confident in stakeholders about the Directorate’s new legislative mandate and to contextualise, review and make recommendations in dealing with rape cases.”
Deputy Minister Sotyu emphasised that there must be a clear mechanism of pro-active monitoring and a suitable and operational location where this proactive monitoring will be done by ICD on rapes committed by police. In future the ICD will transform its operational framework and mandate and will be known as Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID), thus rebranding itself as an “investigative” body as opposed to a “complaints” receiving body.
The Deputy Minister further urged the ICD to forge partnerships with professional partners to develop and obtain accurate rape statistics and to ensure that there is no under-reporting of rape cases. “IPID Act immediately expands the ICD workload considerably; and there is currently major capacity constraints in staff trained as investigators. Therefore, the recently established Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences (FCS) units within the South African Police Service (SAPS) should be considered as a main partner, as there are already 1 896 FCS investigators fully trained nationally. Having immediate sufficient experienced rape investigators is therefore critical,” added the Deputy Minister.
For the financial year 2009/10, 12 police officers were charged for rape and for the year 2010/11, there were 35 police officers. From the above total amount of 47 cases so far those found guilty were 18; those not guilty were 6; 12 were withdrawn; and 11 are currently pending.
“Rape is a lifetime trauma and it must be condemned and severely punished. These statistics are disturbing and that is why there must be a thorough forensic support to investigate rape cases. Again, the SAPS Forensics must be called to assist for training and investigations of such cases. Of critical importance is that IPID must place obligations on SAPS management to take proactive steps to ensure that IPID is an ally and not a foe,” pointed out Deputy Minister Sotyu.
“We want to ensure that in cases where a police officer is suspected of committing such crimes, that such a case is investigated by an independent body. This approach will go a long way in building public confidence in the police while at the same time, re-enforcing government’s commitment to ensure the most vulnerable in society, are not abused by the very people who should protect them,” she added.
She further challenged the ICD to quickly begin strengthening partnerships with the Justice, Crime Prevention and Security (JCPS) cluster, the Department of Women, Children and People with Disabilities with an aim of conducting public workshops to educate, inform, and advocate on various legislative reforms. These include Prevention of Violence Act, the Sexual Offences Act, the Domestic Violence Act, the Criminal Law Amendment Act and the Criminal Procedure Act.
“In this context, the IPID Act obligates us never to turn a blind eye on perceived biased police involvement on reported cases or as a result of police action. We remain confident that the investigative role of IPID in investigating rape by a police officer or in police custody will instil confidence in members of the public. It will further address society’s frustrations and fears for their safety, knowing that police officers who transgressed will be dealt accordingly.”
The Ministry of Police remains committed to fighting crime, particularly in relation to the vulnerable in society including women and children. The commitment is clearly shown on the strengthening of our oversight bodies: the ICD and the Secretariat to seek to re-organise strengthen and re-brand the existing SAPS oversight bodies to make them more effective.
For enquiries, please contact:
Zweli Mnisi, Spokesperson to the Minister and Deputy Minister of Police
Cell: 082 045 4024
