Bill
In view of the “shoot to kill” call by senior government leaders, it is difficult to understand the killing of Atlegang as anything but a callous execution in pursuit of a policy directive. President has attempted to backpeddle, but this has yet to filter down to officers on the ground in whose minds the long-standing call remains firmly etched. When she was deputy minister of police, initiated, to applause from the African National Congress (ANC), this bloodthirsty orgy, which can only result in more needless deaths. This government-sponsored blood-letting is now zealously promoted by the deputy minister of police, Fikile Mbalula, with the president’s tacit approval. It is a shameful admission of failure.
Crime has spun out of control because the government refuses to enforce the law impartially. The simple lesson from the high crime rates is that law enforcement is indivisible. The selective implementation of the law has led to a total breakdown of law enforcement. Violent protests in which rights are trampled by political allies of the ANC are ignored. No one has ever been prosecuted for some of the heinous crimes committed by protesters.
Community protests have invariably ended up with public property destroyed and the government has chosen to negotiate with the groups responsible. Anyone is free to saunter into the country and hijack a building if they so please — the government shows no interest. The Congress of South African Students disrupts matric exams in the Western Cape and the government does nothing to protect the rights of those whose rights are attacked.
Criminals are no fools — they can see the government has no stomach for firmly enforcing the law.
Khehla
Khehla
I agree with all you say but, of course, one could go much further. Think of all the ANC cadres who have been found guilty of theft, fraud and corruption. Few of them are held to account. Similarly, audit reports show corruption has become a way of life in the public service, but no one is punished and, indeed, they’ve all been rewarded with 13% pay rises.
However, in one respect I sympathise with the Zuma administration. When Mbeki was, over and over again, presented with the evidence of rising crime he would react with petulant denial: it was all really just a matter of whites badmouthing SA; it was all a matter of perceptions; it was wicked to say that SA was the rape capital of the world, even if it was; and really all that was happening was that white areas were now experiencing the same crime rates that black areas had habitually suffered. It was a criminally irresponsible attitude and, as with HIV/AIDS, the situation was allowed to get way out of hand.
Zuma and his ministers are facing the result. They at least are not in denial.
They understand that the poor suffer most from crime and they acknowledge that South African crime is especially violent. And, thank heaven, they want to do something to stop it. We can all fulminate against trigger-happy policemen killing innocents but really one has to come up with some alternative forms of positive action which could make a serious dent in crime. At the moment many hundreds of policemen are getting killed every year, often when they are off duty, as revenge for having brought criminals to book. While that is going on, it is foolish to imagine that a lot of policemen won’t decide to get their revenge in first.
Bill
Bill
The government can take a few steps that will immediately improve the safety of citizens and rid us of the shoot-to-kill bravado, which only serves to mask government inadequacies. All crimes must be prosecuted regardless of the wrongdoer. Interest groups that have gained power that is in excess of what is fair — starting with Cosatu, which is effectively shielded from prosecution — must be stripped of that power and the government must step up to the plate by governing and stop behaving like an NGO.
Police training and remuneration must be re-examined as they are a source of problems. President Zuma must assert his leadership and order deputy minister Mbalula to stop his blood-curdling shoot-to-kill nonsense or be shown the door. The country’s borders must be secured.
Principles of equity, on which the anti-apartheid struggle was fought, must be given effect.
In the long term, the government must improve its responsiveness to citizens. Issues about which the community protested at Sakhile township in Standerton were raised in an audit report, which the government ignored until the mob was in the streets burning public buildings. These objectives hardly amount to a stretch target or rocket science.
Khehla
Khehla
Not long ago I talked to the head of a top private security agency who is intimately aware of the law and order world in his province.
He pointed out to me that the policeman at the head of the drugs squad was taking regular bribes from all the biggest drug dealers, that the head of the traffic department was in hock to the taxi bosses — and so on. Every single police departmental head was involved in a corrupt relationship with the very groups he was supposed to police.
I have little doubt that this applies across provinces and that the Selebi-Agliotti relationship is mirrored at every level on down. And, of course, we all know that this has penetrated all the way down to ground level — the police who stop one for a traffic offence often openly ask for a bribe, usually described as a “spot fine”. That is, the upper-level cops have simply behaved like other public service workers and used their office for private enrichment. This leaves the ground-level cops facing violent criminals rather at sea, and it is not terribly surprising that they are behaving more and more like an out-of-control street gang.
So really I’d suggest that the place to start is with a general clean-up of the police. But of this there is absolutely no sign.
It is probably germane to note that Zuma has appointed a Zulu police minister, a Zulu national police commissioner and a Zulu chief justice — all from a little clique in Durban. After his tribulations with the law, Zuma has thus got the law and order business under secure control. I greatly doubt these place-men have any thought of turning things upside down in the way you or I suggest .
Bill
Bill
There is no doubt President Zuma appreciates tribalism is a bane of Africa but I am flummoxed why he let what some now refer to as the Zulufication of critical government leadership take root. He should easily recall that one of the reasons Mbeki disliked Mandela is that the latter initially supported Ramaphosa for ANC president in an attempt to quash the view the ANC was controlled by Xhosas. In making some of the appointments Zuma should, like Mandela, have exercised due care.
As for the reckless shoot-to-kill policy, it must be withdrawn without qualification and the president should consider apologising to South Africans for the pain they have endured thus far.
Khehla
Khehla
I shouldn’t think the policy will get withdrawn easily or quickly, so we’d better reconcile ourselves to the fact that we’re living through a Wild West period in which one just hopes the sheriff is a better gunslinger than the outlaws.
I can well understand the instinct to restore order by almost any means. The apparently inevitable fractiousness and corruption of African political life has often triggered such responses elsewhere. One thinks of the Nigerian police being issued with horsewhips for ill-disciplined motorists, or Jerry Rawlings lining up corrupt politicians on the beach and shooting them in scores. Last time I was in Ghana I found this was still a popular policy since people had been driven to distraction by their rulers’ corruption and incompetence .
Unfortunately, the Zuma government isn’t promising anything similar for our corrupt politicians. It will be interesting to see, after a year or two, what effect, if any, the new policy has had on crime. Whatever happens, there will be plenty of collateral damage.
Bill