Message by the National Commissioner of the South African Police Service General Riah Phiyega at the launch of the National Community Outreach PlanNational Police Day 2014Botshabelo Stadium, Free State
Deputy Minister MM Sotyu
Free State MECs of Police and Transport. Education, and Sports and Culture
All Deputy National Commissioners
All Provincial and Divisional Commissioners
All Members of the South African Police Service (SAPS) present
Leaders from different Interfaith Denominations present
Leaders from business and civic organisations present
Representatives from labour unions, POPCRU and SAPU
Representatives from various community policing forums
Distinguished Guests
Members of the Media
Ladies and Gentlemen
A very warm welcome to everyone present here today. I am sure we are grateful to be well, refreshed and entering into this new year re-energized to fight crime.
Allow me to thank every member of the SAPS who has worked very hard, and smartly, during the holidays to ensure that all those who were on holiday, were and felt safe. It is indeed a brand new year and we expect to build on the positive achievements of the SAPS.
On 27 January 1995, the South African Police Service Act, 1995 (Act No 68 of 1995) was promulgated. On 27 January 2005, the SAPS celebrated its 10th Anniversary as a service. As of that year, 27 January is celebrated as National Police Day.
Ladies and gentlemen, our men and women in blue work hard. They work long hours. I wish to recognise and thank each one of them for ensuring that our country and its citizenry are safe.
The National Police Day is a special day to all of us, for it is on this day that we pause and take time to reflect about the significance and meaning of the policing profession and its significance to society. We cherish the opportunity granted by our government, for us to use this day to recommit to our higher order purpose of keeping South Africa and its people safe and peaceful. We further use this opportunity to continue driving awareness around the work of the police.
At this juncture let me remind us what the constitution of the Country stipulates as the primary functions of the police:
- To prevent crime
- To detect crime
- To investigate crime
- To maintain public order and ensure that there is stability • To enforce the law
Prevention of crime is an area that we remain focused upon because we believe there is still much more to be done and to be achieved in this space. The Police Day celebrations today seek to advance the crime prevention and awareness agenda.
In the past, Police Day celebrations focused only on police members. The community was not optimally involved. As we analysed this approach, we found it to be limited in terms of contributing towards the SAPS’ strategic priorities.
The National Police Day, starting from today going forward, will be used as a way of reminding ourselves that core to our policing philosophy is the critical role played by the community. As of today, we will use this day to reach out to our people. Today as we are gathered here, I stand before you to announce and recommit the South African Police service to the advancement of a partnership entered into with the Department of Basic Education, our Government as a whole and all the key stakeholders; the community and all relevant stakeholders.
In April 2011, the Minister of Police and the Minister of Basic Education signed an agreement that sought to roll out prevention of crime and violence in schools.
Through this programme we seek to:
- Strengthen safe school committees in addressing crime and violence in schools
- For officials of both departments to assume an active role as members of the Safe School Committees
- To link schools to local Police Stations, and our cops to adopt the identified schools
- To raise awareness amongst children and young learners regarding crime and violence and its impact on individuals, families and education
- To mobilise communities to take ownership of schools and to support them on keeping the school environment safe and peaceful through this intervention
- To encourage the establishment of systems to report crime and violence at these schools
- To implement school-based crime prevention programmes in collaboration with provincial, as well as district and local officials responsible for school safety
- Through this initiative we seek to encourage an integrated and multi-disciplinary approach towards crime prevention in our schools
- We remain committed to driving a community based and inclusive approach towards prevention of crime in schools.
- As SAPS we seek to build positive relations with schools and the broader schools community.
We introduced the police officials that shall be adopting the schools we visited this morning, as a foretaste of what shall be rolled out throughout the country.
SAPS leaders from the various provinces have joined us here today to take their batons to advance the race in their respective Provinces.
School safety is not an event but a process, we shall engage with all stakeholders and partners to ensure that we strengthen continuity of the implementation of the agreement, as well as to ensure sustained outcomes for the school safety initiative. We are planning to connect to 9000 schools in the 1st phase of this initiative that is being rolled out. We should not only launch, we should come back and account on how we are progressing.
Furthermore as part of our outreach policing efforts, we are seeking to expose the community, our partner in preventing and dealing with crime, to some of the essential services that facilitate policing.
We have in our midst today our SAPS bands as well as our SAPS choirs. We've named this process Project Harmony. This is because we simply want to continue to build harmonious relationships with the communities we serve. In executing our duties, we receive a great deal of assistance from members of the public. This kind of assistance is invaluable.
We continue to cherish the partnership and support of the community in our efforts to police the country. We are winning this battle, we continue to arrest very serious and most wanted criminals. We have appreciated, most immensely, community support in our pursuance of the man whose name was on the lips of many South Africans. I stand here before you to say that we have Rodavan Krejcir behind bars and if everything goes the way we have planned, he is going to remain there for a long, long time. The party which he started a few years ago, regrettably joined by some of our members, is now over!
His arrest, and the arrests of those around him, is a perfect example of what can be achieved when different units of SAPS work together with members of the community. We have and continue to receive a lot of information from members of the public. Let me use to opportunity to congratulate and sincerely thank the multi-disciplinary team working on these investigations. Let's give them a huge round of applause for their dedication, hard work and the professionalism they've displayed in dealing with this rather risky operation. Phanzi nge crime, phanzi! Phambili nge crime prevention phambili!
Ladies and gentlemen, in celebrating police day, we will work together and engage on issues of crime and mobilise the general community to participate in crime prevention initiatives.
In this regard, Community Police Forums have a critical role to play in bringing policing closer and closer to our communities. We have a lot of work to do still. I have tasked our new Deputy National Commissioner of policing Lieutenant General Sitole to meet with the leadership of all Community Police Forums. We have to work hard together in order to strengthen relationships with our communities so that we also change some of the negative public perceptions of the SAPS.
We realise that it is crucial that we continue with this type of engagements as a way of increasing public confidence and enhancing our relationships with the communities. Through enhanced relationships, we will be able to prevent more crimes as opposed to always reacting to issues of crime. Reactive policing is expensive and unsustainable.
In conclusion, it is my privilege to introduce the woman behind the ongoing process of fully transforming the SAPS by pushing us to work harder and render efficient and professional services to our clients, the Deputy Minister Police; Hon Deputy Minister Sotyu a daughter of the soil. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce and present to you would our keynote speaker, the Deputy Minister of Police, Mme Makgotso Sotyu.
